A Tricky Gray Area - Part One
by Madeline77
Summary: This is part one of my three-part Arrested Development fanfiction about Michael and Lindsay's relationship, in which I imagine that as teenagers their relationship was similar to George Michael and Maeby's, with lots of inappropriate romantic tension and other fun stuff. Part one covers their teenage years (1983-1987). This is intended to be read after the prologue.
1. Chapter 1

_April, 1983_

Michael sat at his desk, crossing out the times he'd written throughout the day and putting tally marks next to his list of corresponding half-hour intervals. He heard a knock on his door.

"Come in," he said, looking up as his twin sister came into the room, holding a bottle of vodka in one hand and squeezing two glasses against her body with her other arm.

"Look what I've got," she said in a sing-song voice. "Mom left it out. Do you want to try it?"

"Isn't it illegal?" Michael said uncertainly.

She laughed. "That's what makes it _fun_. And I think it's only illegal for other people to sell it to us or something. Anyway, Mom and Dad are gone at that dinner thing so we're not going to get caught." She walked over to him and set the bottle and glasses on the desk. "Come on, it will be fun."

"Okay," Michael said, embarrassed at his hesitation.

"Great," she said brightly and poured the drinks, filling the glasses to the top. She picked up her glass. "Cheers!" she said.

"Cheers," Michael laughed, picking up his glass and clinking it with hers. He watched her take a drink, then quickly drank his before she noticed his hesitation. He winced at the bitter taste and the prickly sensation in his throat. Why did people drink this stuff? He could tell from Lindsay's face that she was similarly unimpressed, but she didn't say so, so he didn't either.

"What are you working on?" she asked, pulling his list closer to her. "Oh my god, are you doing homework on a Saturday night?"

"No, I've been keeping track of when I sell the most bananas to figure out when my lunch break should be," he told her. Lindsay stared at him in disbelief.

"Okay, it's a good thing I interrupted this," she said. "Come on, let's sit on the bed." She took her drink and pranced over to the bed. She positioned his pillow against the headboard and leaned against it. He got up from his desk and sat down next to her, already feeling a little light-headed, his face growing warm.

"So, I bought my dress for the Eighth Grade Prom today," she said cheerfully. "It's _so_ cute. It's black and strapless with little differently colored dots all over the skirt. Oh, and it's got this adorable hot pink bow…"

"That's great, Lindsay," Michael said sarcastically. Lindsay had a tendency to hijack their conversations and go on and on about things that only concerned her. She smirked and took another sip of her drink.

"You know what Mom said when I showed her the dress?" she continued. "She said, 'Are you sure you don't want something longer to cover up those chubby legs?'"

"Wow," he said.

"I know, right?" She forced a laugh, but the bitterness was plain in her voice. "You don't think my legs are chubby, do you?"

"No, of course not," Michael said automatically.

"Really?" she pressed. "You're not just saying that to be nice?"

He rolled his eyes. "No, I'm not just saying that to be nice," he said, pretending to be exasperated even though he wasn't.

She smiled warmly at him. "Thanks," she said.

Michael was used to Lindsay constantly asking him for reassurance that she was pretty. He didn't mind. It was understandable given how frequently their mother criticized her, and it was nice to feel needed.

He saw that her glass was already half empty. He reluctantly drank more, trying to catch up. It really was disgusting.

"Anyway," Lindsay continued, taking another sip. "Who are you taking to the dance?"

"It's an eighth grade dance, you don't need a date."

"It's an eighth grade _prom_ , and yes, you do," she corrected. "At least you do if you don't want to look like a loser."

"Lots of people are going without dates," he said defensively. "And they don't even call it the Eighth Grade Prom anymore." The school had changed the name two years ago when people started showing up in limos, but Lindsay still insisted on calling it the Eighth Grade Prom.

"Come on, isn't there anyone you want to ask?" she pressed.

"No, there isn't," he said flatly, starting to get annoyed.

"What about Sally Sitwell? She likes you."

"She does?"

"Ha! I knew it!" she said triumphantly. "I knew you liked her!"

"Oh," he said, annoyed and embarrassed. "So you were just making that up?"

"Oh, no, it's true," she said quickly. "She _definitely_ likes you, it's really obvious," she said, her words a little slurred.

This was news to Michael. He'd had a crush on Sally for over a year, but he'd always thought it was unreciprocated. "Are you sure?" he asked.

" _Yes._ So you should ask her! She'll be thrilled."

"I'll think about it."

"You'll think about it? What does that mean?"

"It means I'll think about it!"

"Oh my _god_ , Michael. She likes you, you like her, what is there to think about?"

"I'm not sure I want to go with her," he protested.

"Yes, you do, you're just scared."

"No, that's not true—"

Lindsay began to do her signature chicken dance, a practice she'd adopted from their older brother. "Cha, chee cha, chee cha!"

"Oh, goddamn it," he said. "Stop!"

"Cha, chee cha, chee cha!"

"Okay, fine, I'll ask her!" he snapped.

"Good," she said smugly. "I'm holding you to that."

"Jesus," he muttered. "That doesn't even look like a chicken."

Lindsay laughed and leaned her head back against the wall. "Okay, I'm starting to feel drunk," she said. "What about you?"

"Yeah, a little," he said, his head feeling a little fuzzy.

"Good," she laughed, getting off the bed and walking over to the desk, a little unsteady. "You need to loosen up more." She refilled her glass.

"Aren't you starting to feel sick?" Michael asked, surprised.

"Not really," she replied, her words a little slurred.

"Alright," he said skeptically. He was starting to feel a little nauseous himself, and she'd had almost twice as much as him. He wondered if she was pretending to like it more than she did.

She walked back to the bed. "Scoot over," she said, sitting down next to him. Her black and white check skirt slipped down to show her thigh as she sat, but she didn't fix it. "You haven't asked me about my date to the dance yet," she said.

"That's 'cause I already know who it is," he said. "You've told me _a million_ times."

"Yes, because it's _Brian Peterson._ He's like the cutest guy in the whole school!"

"Yeah, I've heard that a million times, too."

"Ugh, fine. What d'you want to talk about?"

"I dunno. Anything but Brian Peterson."

"Okay," she said, the corners of her mouth curling up into a sly smile. "We'll talk about Sally, then."

"No, that's worse—"

"You said anything!"

"Oh my god."

She laughed and took another sip of her drink. "She's gonna say yes, you know."

He hesitated. "You really think so?"

" _Yes,"_ she said emphatically, grabbing his arm. "And she should. You're a great guy."

"Thanks," he said, surprised. "You're pretty great, too," he added.

"Aww, you're so sweet," she teased. She smiled at him. "This is fun."

"Yeah," he agreed. He really was enjoying himself now. There was something exciting about breaking the rules, especially with someone as cool as Lindsay. Though he would never admit it, he was more than a little jealous of his twin sister's popularity.

"Ugh," she said suddenly, sitting up.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Nothing, just feeling a little sick."

Michael looked at her glass and saw that it was almost empty. "Yeah, I can see why."

"Shut up," she said, leaning her head back against the wall and closing her eyes.

"You okay?" he laughed.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she snapped. She sat up suddenly. "Oh god, I think I'm gonna throw up," she said, and got up and ran out of the room.


	2. Chapter 2

_February, 1984_

Lindsay hurried into her room, threw her backpack on the floor, and went straight to her closet. She stood on her toes and reached for the top shelf, feeling around for her copy of _Flowers in the Attic_. She found it and pulled it down from the shelf, then jumped onto her bed and rapidly flipped through the pages, trying to find her place.

That morning she'd gotten ready for school as quickly as she could so she would have time to read. She'd just gotten to the part where Chris came into the bathroom while Cathy was admiring her naked body in the mirror when Michael called to her from downstairs to tell her it was time to go. She'd frantically read two more paragraphs before he'd called her again to ask what was taking so long, after which she'd quickly returned the book to its hiding place and hurried downstairs. She'd spent the whole day at school dying to know what happened next.

She found her place and resisted the temptation to read from where she'd left off, starting instead where Chris first came into the room. Now that she had time she wanted to read it slowly to fully take it in.

 _A rippling sensation on the back of my neck gave me the awareness that someone was near, and watching. I whirled about suddenly to catch Chris standing in the deep shadows of the closet. Silently he'd come from the attic. How long had he been there? Had he seen all the silly, immodest things I'd done? Oh, God, I hoped not!_

 _He stood as one frozen. A queer look glazed his blue eyes, as if he'd never seen me before without my clothes on—and he had, many a time. Perhaps when the twins were there, sun- bathing with us, he kept his thoughts brotherly and pure, and didn't really stare._

 _His eyes lowered from my flushed face down to my breasts, then lower, and lower, and down to my feet before they traveled upward ever so slowly._

 _I stood trembling, uncertain, wondering what to do that wouldn't make me seem a foolish prude in the judgment of a brother who knew well how to mock me when he chose. He seemed a stranger, older, like someone I had never met before. He also seemed weak, dazed, perplexed, and if I moved to cover myself, I'd steal from him something he'd been starving to see. Time seemed to stand still as he lingered in the closet, and I hesitated before the dresser which revealed to him the rear view, too, for I saw his eyes flick to the mirror to take in what that reflected._

 _"Chris, please go away."_

 _He didn't seem to hear._

 _He only stared._

 _I blushed all over and felt perspiration under my arms, and a funny pounding began in my pulse. I felt like a child caught with her hand in the cookie jar, guilty of some petty crime, and terribly afraid of being severely punished for almost nothing. But his look, his eyes, made me come alive, and my heart began a fierce, mad throbbing, full of fright. Why should I be afraid? It was only Chris._

 _For the first time I felt embarrassed, ashamed of what I had now, and quickly I reached to pick up the dress I'd just taken off. Behind that I would shield myself, and I'd tell him to go away._

 _"Don't," he said when I had the dress in my hands._

 _"You shouldn't. . ." I stammered, trembling more._

 _"I know I shouldn't be, but you look so beautiful. It's like I never saw you before. How did you grow so lovely, when I was here all the time?"_

 _How to answer a question like that? Except to look at him, and plead with my eyes._

 _Just then, behind me, a key turned in the door lock._

"Damn!" Lindsay whispered. She read a few more paragraphs, then flipped ahead when it was clear nothing more was going to happen, scanning the pages. A promising sentence caught her eye: _"That night I went to sleep thinking about his kiss."_ She stopped reading, deciding she didn't want to spoil the surprise. She memorized the page number so she would know how close she was to it, then turned back to the page she was on and continued reading.

A few days ago a friend had told her about a book she'd read about a girl locked in an attic who has sex with her brother. Lindsay was immediately intrigued and asked to borrow her copy. Since then she'd been secretly reading it every chance she got. She felt a little uncomfortable about enjoying it so much, but it was only because it was so taboo. It had nothing to do with how she felt about Michael, or her other brothers.


	3. Chapter 3

_June, 1985_

"Gentlemen, start your engines," Michael said to himself as he watched a tall blonde walking down the boardwalk, wearing heels and a tight denim skirt. Lindsay had a skirt like that…

"Shit," he said as his twin sister turned around. She smiled and waved at him and made her way towards the banana stand, where he was working. He waved back, feeling very uncomfortable. It didn't mean anything, he hadn't realized it was her. He tried not to think about the dream he'd had about her a few nights ago, which was disconcerting enough on its own but made much worse by the fact that it was not the first dream he'd had about her.

"Hi," Lindsay said brightly when she reached the banana stand.

"Hi," he said awkwardly, not meeting her eyes.

"What's up with you?"

"What? Nothing," he said quickly.

She raised her eyebrows. "Okay," she said. "Um, can I have a Giddy Girly Banana?"

"Sure," he said. "What are you doing here?" he asked as he took a frozen banana out of the freezer and dipped it in chocolate sauce.

"I'm meeting Andrew in about ten minutes," she said.

"Oh," Michael said, feeling a twinge of annoyance. Andrew was Lindsay's new boyfriend. Michael didn't particularly like him, partly because Lindsay wouldn't stop talking about him and partly because he thought it was weird that someone who was about to start college was dating someone who was going into her sophomore year of high school. True, if Lindsay hadn't repeated ninth grade she would be going into her junior year, but it was still a two-year age difference.

He finished rolling the banana in candy hearts and handed it to her. "Okay, that's ninety-nine cents," he said.

"You're joking, right?"

"What?"

"I don't need to pay for this."

"Uh, yeah, you do."

"It's a Bluth Frozen Banana! I'm a Bluth!"

"Sorry, Dad checks at the end of each week and the number of bananas has to match the amount of money in here."

"Dad would be okay with it," she said. Michael laughed.

"No, he would not. Trust me, I've asked him, I'm not allowed to have any without paying."

"I'm calling him."

"Seriously?"

She stalked over to a nearby payphone. "It's ninety-nine cents!" he called after her. "You're paying almost that much for the phone call!" he added as she dialed the number.

"Hey, Dad, it's Linds," she said. "Yeah, I'm at the banana stand right now and Michael says I have to pay for a frozen banana, but it's free for me, right? Thanks, I'll tell him. Bye, love you!" she hung up and turned to Michael. "He says you have to give it to me."

"What?" he said angrily.

"You heard me!" she said as she returned to the stand.

"Fine, here," he snapped, handing her the banana.

"Thank you," she said gloatingly and took the banana and flounced away.


	4. Chapter 4

_December, 1985_

"Almost ready?" Michael said, coming into Lindsay's room as she did her hair and makeup for school.

"Almost," she said, not taking her eyes from the mirror of her vanity as she carefully applied electric blue mascara. "Hey, do you think you could help me with my English essay tonight?"

"When you say help, do you mean edit it or write it for you?"

"Um…I was thinking more on the write-it-for me side—"

"No."

"Michael—"

"No! I don't have time to do all your homework for you!"

"Please, I really need to bring up my grade in this class," she pleaded. He hesitated. She knew she'd chosen the right tactic, as Michael seemed to care more about her grades than she did.

"Look, I'll edit it for you, but you're writing it yourself," he said.

"Fine," she sighed, trying not to smile. Michael had 'edited' her essays before, which basically meant she gave him a few half-baked ideas and he came up with a topic and outline for her and then edited what she wrote so heavily that it was pretty much his essay. She'd asked him to write it for her so he would think he'd won when he agreed to help, knowing he wouldn't be able to resist the opportunity to show off.

"Okay, we'd better go," he said.

"One second," she said as she sprayed on Liz Claiborne perfume.

"Come on, we're going to be late."

"We're not going to be late," she sighed, tousling her hair with her fingers one last time and inspecting the results in the mirror. "Okay, done." She got up and grabbed her backpack from the bed.

"Good, let's go," he said impatiently.

"Jeez, we're only…three minutes late," she said, glancing at her alarm clock as she followed him out of the room. The door to their parents' room opened and their mother came into the hallway.

"Oh, Lindsay, before you go," Lucille said. Michael groaned impatiently. "Early birthday present," she said, handing her a check.

"Oh, thanks!" Lindsay said, eagerly taking the check. Her eyes widened when she saw the amount. "Oh my god, three thousand dollars!" she said in disbelief. Then she saw the rest of it. "'A new nosey?'" she read.

"It's for plastic surgery," Lucille explained. "It's about time we did something about that nose of yours."

It felt like she'd been slapped. Her mother had always criticized her appearance, but she'd never done something like this. She felt her face grow hot with embarrassment as she scrambled to find something to say.

"Jesus, Mom!" Michael said angrily. Lindsay felt a rush of gratitude for him.

"What?" Lucille said. "She looks like a can opener!"

"No, she doesn't! You've got to stop saying stuff like this!"

"Yeah, what kind of mother are you?!" Lindsay said, finally finding the words, though she was still stinging from the can opener comment. Lucille turned to her.

"So you don't want it?" she said, surprised.

"No, I don't want it!" Lindsay said angrily, giving the check back to her. "How can you treat me this way?"

"Good grief, I was only trying to help you. You should be thanking me!"

"Thanking you?!" Lindsay repeated incredulously, the pitch of her voice rising.

"Come on, Lindsay, let's go," Michael said, touching her arm.

"Right behind you," she said, glaring at her mother as she turned and stormed down the stairs, Michael following behind her. _I hate her, I hate her,_ she thought, tears of anger welling up in her eyes. She knew she shouldn't think that, that you weren't supposed to hate your own mother, but what had she ever done to deserve her love? She was so sick of the constant reminders that she wasn't pretty enough, that she was fat, that her nose was too big, reminders that were so much worse because they came from her own mother.

"Sorry about that, Linds," Michael said when they were outside. The sky was pale gray and the air smelled like rain. "Try not to let her get to you."

"I'm not," Lindsay said stiffly, looking down at the driveway, which was beginning to be speckled with raindrops.

"Good," he said, though he didn't seem entirely convinced. "Your nose is fine by the way," he added. "She's just looking for something to criticize."

"Thanks," she said quietly. She knew it wasn't true, but she loved him for saying it.

"Okay, we'd better hurry, we're really late now," he said, getting into the car.

"We'll be fine," she sighed exasperatedly, but she smiled as she did. It was hard to be annoyed at him right now.


	5. Chapter 5

_December, 1985_

"Look at you," Lindsay said to herself, turning around and admiring her new outfit in the mirror from various angles. It was the night of her seventeenth birthday and her mother had taken her shopping earlier that day. She felt pretty sexy in her oversize top, tight jeans, stacked rubber bracelets, and studded high-heeled boots. Her eyes traveled upwards to her face. That looked pretty good, too, she'd done her makeup perfectly that day. All except for the nose.

She sat down on the bed and took off her boots. She'd spent the last week thinking about her mother's offer. When she'd first given her the check she'd been so angry that she hadn't even considered it, but later that day it hit her that she could really do it. She hated her nose. She was constantly thinking about how much prettier she would be if it was normal-sized, but there was nothing she could do to hide it. It was right in the middle of her face. She knew Michael was right that her mother was just looking for something to criticize and that she shouldn't let it get to her, but it was hard not to when she knew that it was true. Anyone could see it, and the fact that her mother brought it up so much just reminded her how noticeable it was.

She covered her nose with her hand and looked in the mirror, trying to imagine what she would look like if she got the surgery, but she couldn't picture it. Of course, she would have to ask her mother. It would be humiliating, especially after she'd gotten so angry at her about it before. And she would have to tell Michael. It had been so nice to have him on her side. She couldn't bear to throw that away and give him one more reason to be disappointed in her. But as she looked in the mirror she knew she couldn't go through her whole life being tortured by this, not when the solution was so easy. She steeled herself and went to her parents' room and knocked on the door.

"Come in," she heard her mother say.

"Hey, sister," her younger brother Buster said as she stepped into the room. He was sitting on the bed with their mother brushing her hair.

"Hey," she said.

"What is it?" Lucille asked, not turning to look at her.

Lindsay hesitated, then decided it was best just to jump right into it. "Um, so I've been thinking about it, and I decided I actually do want to do the plastic surgery," she said, looking down at the carpet. She reluctantly looked up as Lucille turned to her and smiled gloatingly.

"Good," she said. "I'll schedule the consultation."

"Okay," Lindsay said stiffly, and turned and left the room.

"Happy birthday!" Lucille called after her. _I hate you,_ Lindsay thought.


	6. Chapter 6

_January, 1986_

" _Alive and kicking…"_ Lindsay sang along with the radio as she drove home from school. _"Stay until your love is…"_

"Can you please stop?" Michael groaned. She laughed.

"Fine," she said. It had been a month since she'd decided to get the surgery, and it was scheduled for next week. She still hadn't told Michael. She knew she would have to eventually and that the longer she waited the worse it would be, but she couldn't stop putting it off.

"Guess what?" she said.

"What?"

"I'm going to senior prom. With Andrew, 'cause he's a senior."

"That's great," Michael said sarcastically.

"Yeah, it is," she said, ignoring his sarcasm.

"You know, I really don't like Andrew."

Lindsay rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I know. You've made that pretty clear."

"No, really. He's…he's been saying stuff about you, you know."

"Saying stuff? Like what?"

Michael hesitated. "He's been saying that you two have been sleeping together," he said, clearly embarrassed.

"He has?" Lindsay said, surprised.

"Yeah, so break up with him!"

Lindsay blushed. "I don't mind if he tells people that," she said as she pulled into the driveway and stopped the car.

"You don't mind?" Michael repeated. "Well, you should, he's your boyfriend, he shouldn't be making up rumors about you."

"Well, he's not making it up…"

Michael looked over at her. "What?" he said. Lindsay laughed shyly. "Since when?"

"Just last week," she said excitedly.

"Oh," Michael said. "I didn't know you'd… Well, okay." He seemed very disturbed by this news. "Don't you think it's a little soon?"

"Not really. We've been dating for almost a year."

"Yeah, I guess," Michael said, though he seemed to disagree. They got out of the car and walked through the gate into the backyard and in through the kitchen door.

"Wait, isn't he eighteen?" he said suddenly.

"Yeah. So?"

"So you're seventeen. That's illegal, isn't it?"

"Oh my god, Michael, he's one year older than me."

"Just barely! It's more like two years, you only turned seventeen last month."

"What are you gonna do, call the cops?"

"No, I just—whatever, do whatever you want, I guess."

They opened the door and stepped into the house. Lindsay got a glass of water and sat down at the kitchen table. Michael sat down, too. He still looked pretty upset. She wondered, not for the first time, if he had something of a crush on her. Sometimes it seemed like he did, from the way he looked at her, how he was always telling her how pretty she was, and his inexplicable dislike of every boyfriend she'd had. It wouldn't be the first time someone in their family had been attracted to someone else in their family. She didn't mind if he was. It wasn't creepy or anything since she doubted he was even aware of it, and it was very flattering.

Lucille and Buster came into the room, wearing matching sailor costumes.

"We're going to the Balboa Bay Window photo shoot, so we'll be gone for the next few hours," she said. "Rosa will make you something for dinner."

"As usual," Lindsay said under her breath. "You know, not that I'd want to, but why do you only do those creepy photo shoot things with Buster?" Buster smiled smugly. "You do have three other kids, you know."

"Oh, please, with that nose?" Lucille said over her shoulder as she fixed Buster's jacket. "Thank god we're taking care of that next week."

Lindsay froze.

"What do you mean, 'taking care of that?'" Michael said.

"The plastic surgery, of course," Lucille said, bending down to put on her shoes.

"She's not doing that, we already told you," Michael said angrily. Lucille stood up and looked at him, then at Lindsay, eyebrows raised.

"Um, I actually changed my mind about that," Lindsay said quietly, not meeting his eyes.

"What?" he said.

"Well, I'll let you two discuss this," Lucille said, opening the door. Lindsay hated the look of amusement on her face. "Come on, Buster."

Buster followed Lucille out the door.

"What do you mean, you changed your mind?" Michael said when they were gone.

"There's no need to make a big deal about it," Lindsay mumbled.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I don't know, I just—I don't know," she said helplessly.

"You can't let her get to you like this," he said. "You look fine, really."

"I'm not letting her get to me, I want to do this. It's not a big deal, lots of people do it."

"You're only seventeen! Just think about this."

"I have thought about it, a lot, okay?" she snapped. "I don't want to talk about it anymore." She got up and stormed out of the kitchen.

"Wait, Lindsay," Michael called after her, but she ignored him and hurried up the stairs, tears blurring her vision.


	7. Chapter 7

_April, 1986_

Michael looked away from the precalculus homework he had propped against the steering wheel and checked his watch. 3:46. She was sixteen minutes late. He was used to waiting for a long time for Lindsay to meet him in the car after school, but this was getting ridiculous.

Two minutes later he heard the car door open and looked up. He felt an uncomfortable jolt when he saw her. Over two months had passed since the surgery, but it was still a shock every now and then to look at her and see a face so different from the one he'd grown up with. It wasn't that she looked bad—she looked a lot better now actually—but it was unsettling. He knew it didn't matter, but he didn't like the thought that she would never look the same again.

"Eighteen minutes late," he said. She didn't say anything as she sat down and slammed the door shut. "Something wrong?" he asked.

"No," she snapped.

"Alright," he said, starting the car and backing out of the parking space. They sat in silence for a long time.

"Andrew and I broke up," she said suddenly.

"Really?"

"Yeah," she said, annoyed.

"Are you okay?" he asked, realizing he may have sounded a little too happy about this news.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"Good," he said, though she didn't seem fine. "He wasn't worth your time anyway," he added. She didn't say anything. He stopped at a red light and looked over at her. She was looking out the window, her head resting on her hand. He couldn't see her eyes through the Wayfarer sunglasses she'd begged their father to buy for her. "Are you sure you're okay?" he asked.

"Yeah, I told you I was," she snapped. She looked back out the window. "I just wish I knew why," she said suddenly. "It was totally out of the blue. I mean, he's been kind of distant lately but I had no idea he wanted to break up. I just don't know why." Her voice broke on the last word. She took off her sunglasses and wiped her eyes, smudging her blue mascara.

"Well, what did he say?"

"He just said, 'I think we should break up.'"

"That's it?"

"Yeah, just like that. And some bullshit about it not being about me and how he just doesn't want to be in a relationship right now. After ten fucking months, that's all he said."

"Jesus," Michael said. "Sorry, Linds."

"And now I can't even go to the prom," she laughed bitterly. "I already bought my dress and everything."

"Well, you can wear it in a year," he pointed out.

"You're not helping."

"Sorry," he laughed.

She smiled. "It's okay."

Michael wondered if Andrew had broken up with her because of the steep fall in her popularity since she'd returned to school after the surgery. The many enemies she'd made over the years had been quick to seize the opportunity to make fun of her, and she'd quickly become known as the girl with the nose job.

"Well, he's an idiot, he didn't deserve you," Michael said. She laughed through her tears.

"You're just saying that 'cause I'm crying."

"No, I mean it. He was lucky to have you."

She looked over at him. "You really mean that?"

"Yeah, really," he said, smiling reassuringly.

"Thank you," she said quietly. She looked out the window and laughed. "Why can't all guys be like you?"


	8. Chapter 8

_May, 1986_

Michael walked sleepily into the kitchen, which glowed yellow in the morning light filtering in through the window, and opened the cupboard and pulled out a box of cereal. He looked up as Lindsay came down the stairs in her pink bathrobe, her hair wet from the shower.

"Good, morning," he said.

"Good morning," she replied, going to the fridge and taking out a bottle of orange juice. She poured herself a glass and sat down at the kitchen table.

"You're not going to eat anything?" he asked.

"No, I'm good."

"You sure? I could get you a bowl of cereal."

"Thanks, but I'm not hungry."

"Okay," he said uneasily. Recently he'd noticed that Lindsay was eating less than ever and spending long periods of time swimming laps in their pool every night. He kept hoping he was imagining it, but it was getting increasingly difficult to convince himself that she wasn't skinnier than she had been a month ago. He hoped it wasn't because of their mother, who had shifted the focus of her criticisms from Lindsay's nose to her weight. This was especially baffling since if anything Lindsay had been slightly underweight since middle school, a fact Michael also blamed on their mother. She'd also seemed a little down lately, spending all her time shut in her room and being very irritable. At first he'd thought she was just upset about the breakup and that it would pass, but it had been over a month and her mood hadn't improved at all.

The one bright spot was that they were getting along better. Michael had been trying to be nicer to her after realizing how damaging her insecurity had become. She was quick to latch onto this, spending all her time with him and constantly complaining about some aspect of her appearance just to hear him say it wasn't true. He didn't mind. He liked the way her eyes lit up when he said it, and that she was spending her Friday nights with him on the couch watching TV instead of going out with friends like usual. He couldn't tell if it was because she preferred spending time with him or because she was too depressed to socialize, but either way he liked that he was the one she turned to when she didn't want to talk to anyone else. He just hoped this change in her mood was only temporary and that it would resolve itself.


	9. Chapter 9

_May, 1986_

"No, no, that's not the answer," Michael muttered to himself as he struggled through a particularly difficult problem on his math homework. "Dumb, dumb Michael."

He was distracted by the sound of splashing outside and looked out the window. Lindsay was still down below, swimming furiously across the pool. She must have been out there for an hour. He set his pencil down and got up and went downstairs. He stepped outside and walked to the edge of the pool. The smell of chlorine mixed with the warm night air. He waited for her to reach the end and turn around.

"Oh, hi," she said when she saw him. She stopped and held onto the edge of the pool, breathing heavily. The orange glow of the porch light reflected on her wet skin and the water around her.

"Hi," he said. "How long have you been out here?"

"I don't know," she said breathlessly. "A while."

"Yeah. Don't you think that's enough for tonight?"

"Uh, no, I'm not done yet."

"Come on, Linds, it's unhealthy."

"It's swimming, it's not unhealthy," she laughed.

"It is when you do it for hours every night and don't eat anything!" he said in frustration. The smile slid from her face.

"I'm fine," she said stiffly. "Anything else?"

He stared at her, taken aback by her indifference. "Uh, no, I guess not," he said.

"Okay, then," she said, and dove back under the water and continued swimming across the pool. He stood there for a moment, but he didn't know what else he could do so he turned away and went back inside.


	10. Chapter 10

_June, 1986_

"I mean, I don't really care," Lindsay said to Michael as she drove home from school, the Psychedelic Furs playing on the radio. She had just lost the school election to Sally Sitwell. "I'm just surprised that she got more votes than me."

"Sorry, Lindsay," Michael said. "I thought you would win, too."

Lindsay smiled. She liked this new Michael. A few months ago he wouldn't have tried to comfort her, but things had really changed since then. It made her feel especially guilty for not being among the two percent that had voted for him for student body president a year earlier, but he didn't know that.

"I would be fine with losing," she continued. "I just wish it wasn't to her. Those goddamn posters." Sally had won the election by putting up posters that said, 'I won't leave for two months and come back with a new nose like Lindsay did.'

"Yeah, those were over the line," Michael agreed. "But, to be fair, so were yours. I mean, 'Sally Sitwell's not even that hot?'"

Lindsay rolled her eyes. "You just think she is."

"Well…"

"Shut up," she laughed. She glanced over at him. "Hotter than me?"

Michael raised his eyebrows. "Uh…I'm not going to answer that question."

"Oh. Right," Lindsay laughed, feeling a little embarrassed. "Anyway…"

"Yeah," Michael said, laughing uncomfortably.

"I don't know why you like her so much," Lindsay continued, trying to gloss over the awkwardness. "I just can't stand her. Fat bitch."

"Whoa."

"Sorry. I just…really don't like her."

"Yeah, I can tell," he laughed. He hesitated. "She's not fat, Lindsay."

"I get it, you like her," she groaned.

"No, that's not what I meant." He sounded embarrassed. "It's just that, I'm worried that you think all these people are fat that aren't."

"Oh," she said.

"I've been meaning to talk to you about that, actually," he said quickly. "I've noticed that you've lost a lot of weight lately, and I'm kind of worried about you."

"What?" Lindsay said, laughing forcedly as her heart beat faster. "There's no reason to worry about me."

"It's just, you've been eating almost nothing, and you've been swimming all the time—"

"I'm on a diet," she said, trying to keep her tone light. "It's not a big deal."

"But you really don't need a diet, you're already so thin."

"Thank you."

"No, I mean, you're too thin. It's not healthy."

"Try telling that to Mom," she laughed.

"Don't listen to her," he said seriously. "I don't know what her problem is, but none of what she says is true, not even close."

"Thanks," she said. She loved it when he said things like this. "But you don't need to worry about me, really."

"It would be totally understandable, with all the horrible things she says to you—"

"Michael, I'm fine," she interrupted. "Seriously. Just please drop it."

Michael hesitated. "Okay," he sighed. There was a long silence. "It's just, I care about you, Linds."

Lindsay smiled, trying to hide the emotion that suddenly engulfed her. "I know," she said. "But you're just imagining that there's this problem when there isn't, really."

"Okay," he said, though he didn't sound entirely convinced.

She breathed a quiet sigh of relief. She wished she'd been more discreet about her dieting. But part of her was glad that he'd noticed. She loved it when he worried about her. It made her feel loved, and she was feeling very unloved at the moment. No one else in her family had noticed her sudden weight loss. She had hoped that her mother would see what she'd done to her and feel guilty, but she actually continued to make nasty comments about her weight, completely oblivious to the effort Lindsay was putting in to lose it. She'd thought that at least her father would notice. He'd never been very involved in any of his children's lives, but he'd always seemed to like her the best. But he hadn't noticed, either.

Not that she was doing this for attention. She tried not to let her mother's criticisms bother her, but it was hard not to when she agreed with her. She knew she wasn't overweight, but she wasn't as thin as she would like to be, either. She couldn't stop looking at her thighs in the mirror and wishing they were as thin as some of the girls' at school, including Andrew's new girlfriend. She'd tried dieting in the past but she'd never been able to stick with it for more than a few weeks. That was another thing that had been weighing on her. Her inability to stick with anything had always bothered Michael more than it bothered her, but now it was finally sinking in that she should be starting her senior year of high school in September. Instead she would have to watch her twin brother go off to college in a year while she would be still be stuck at home, all because she'd been too lazy to go to summer school after she failed ninth grade. As she berated herself for this she'd realized she couldn't think of a single thing she'd accomplished that she'd been proud of.

But this would be different. She was done hating her body, not when she could do something about it. She knew there was something perverse about making this her one accomplishment, but for some reason she liked that idea. She soon found that she liked dieting now that she was so determined. It was exciting to see her weight steadily fall, though she always wished it would fall faster. She knew that what she was doing was unhealthy. She often felt tired and light-headed, and she'd even passed out once. Luckily she'd been alone in her room at the time so no one knew. But it actually made her feel better. She liked the idea that she was going to extremes to fix this problem that had tortured her for years, and she felt a savage pleasure as she wallowed in self-pity, telling herself that her own mother had driven her to an eating disorder. And eventually her mother would have to notice and then she would feel guilty.

She had to convince Michael to leave this alone. As much as she loved it when he worried about her, she couldn't have him trying to stop her, not when she finally felt like she had some control over her life.


	11. Chapter 11

_July, 1986_

Michael looked up from his homework at the clock again. 9:13. He could get everyone together now. She might get back from the gym earlier than usual. But they might leave if he made them wait too long. He couldn't remember her ever getting back before 9:30, but she'd only started going to the gym instead of swimming at home about three weeks ago, mostly likely to avoid him. And he hadn't been paying attention to when she got home until the day before, when he'd decided to stage an intervention.

Until now he'd been reluctant to involve his family in this, fearing that they would only make things worse, but he was feeling desperate. A week after their conversation in the car he'd tried to confront her again about her weight loss. He'd even gone to library in preparation and read all about how to talk with a friend with anorexia, but despite the care he'd taken to get rid of distractions and avoid "you"-statements, his attempt to convince her to see a therapist had failed miserably. Now every time he tried to get her to eat something she frostily told him yet again that she was fine, made some excuse to leave the room, and spent the rest of the day avoiding him. She'd been avoiding him all the time, actually. He was sad that the closeness they'd had over the last few months had been so short-lived, but he had to do something. She'd gotten even skinnier in the last month and it was starting to scare him. He hoped that seeing that everyone was worried about her would help, as he was starting to suspect she was partly doing this for attention. He hoped she wouldn't do that, but with Lindsay it wasn't entirely outside the realm of possibility. If she was, it wasn't working. Everyone had been surprised when he told them about her recent weight loss, something that made him more angry than surprised. But with varying amounts of convincing he'd gotten all of them to agree to participate in the intervention.

He looked up again and saw that it was 9:20. He got up and went to his parents' room and knocked on the door, but there was no answer. Next he went to find Gob, who was home from college for the summer. He knocked on his door, but again there was no answer. He went downstairs to the basement where he found his parents watching TV.

"Hey, it's time to get everyone together," he said.

"For what?" George Sr. said.

"Lindsay's intervention," he said.

"Is that today?" Lucille asked.

"Yes, it's today," he said disbelievingly. "I told you yesterday…Whatever, it doesn't matter. Can you go wait in the living room?"

"Alright," Lucille sighed. George Sr. mumbled his agreement.

"Thanks," Michael said, though he wasn't feeling particularly grateful. "Do you know where Gob is?"

"No," George Sr. said unhelpfully.

"Me, neither," said Lucille. "Oh, wait, I think he said he was going to some magic thing."

"Seriously?" Michael said. "Did he say when he was going to be back?"

"No, I don't think so," Lucille said nonchalantly.

Michael sighed in frustration. "Okay, well, we'll just have to do it without him. Just, go wait in the living room while I get Buster."

He ran up the stairs. "Buster?" he called. Buster came out of his room.

"Hey, brother," he said. "Is it time for the intervention?"

Michael breathed a sigh of relief. "Yes, thank you," he said gratefully. "You're the only one who remembered. We're all going to wait in the living room."

They went downstairs. Buster went to the couch and sat between his parents. Michael pushed a chair closer to the couches so that it was facing them and sat down in another chair.

"Okay, so when she gets back, I was thinking we could each take turns saying something to her, so please think about what you're going to say right now."

"Wait, we have to say something?" said George Sr.

"Yes, you have to say something," Michael said, feeling increasingly frustrated.

"Michael, I'm not sure I'm comfortable with that," Buster said nervously.

"All you have to do is tell her that you're worried about her," Michael said. "That's the whole point of this, 'cause she won't listen to me. It's not that much to ask, guys."

"Alright, alright," Lucille said, rolling her eyes. Michael clenched his teeth. He glanced at the clock on the wall. 9:31. She should be there soon.

"How long are we going to have to wait, Michael?" Lucille asked.

"Not long, just please be patient," he snapped. "This is a good opportunity to plan what you're going to say. I really want this to work, so please just try to act like you care about her."

Lucille raised her eyebrows, but he was past caring. This whole thing was her fault anyway. He looked up at the clock again. It was 9:33. He hoped she would get home soon, before any of them decided to leave.

"Can we at least get something to read?" said Lucille.

"No, that will make it look like you don't want to be here. Just wait, plan what you're going to say."

Two minutes passed in frosty silence.

"Really, Michael," George Sr. said.

"Fine, you can get something to read!" Michael snapped. "Just make sure you hide it when she gets here."

But before they could get up, the front door opened and Lindsay walked into the room. She stopped when she saw them all sitting there.

"What's going on?"

"Can you sit down?" Michael said.

"What is this?" she said suspiciously.

"Well, we've all come together because we're concerned about you—"

"Oh no," she said. "Is this some kind of intervention or something?"

"No," Michael said quickly. "I mean, kind of, but—"

"Oh my god," she groaned, turning to leave.

"No, wait, please," he said. She stopped. "Just please sit down and listen to what we've got to say."

She hesitated, then turned around and sat down huffily in the chair Michael had set up for her.

"Thank you," he said, relieved. "So, as I was saying, we've all come together because—"

"Where's Gob?" she interrupted.

Michael's heart sank. "Uh, I don't know. I don't think I was very clear about when we were going to do this." In reality he'd been very clear, but he didn't want her to know that Gob had forgotten. "But he's worried about you, too, he probably didn't realize—"

"It's okay," she interrupted. She looked slightly amused. "Go on."

"Okay," he said gratefully. "Well, we've all noticed that you've lost a lot of weight lately, and we're concerned because we love you and we want you to be healthy. So, we're each going to say a few things. Dad, do you want to go first?" he asked, thinking his father would be the most likely to get through to her since she seemed to be the only one of his children that he liked.

"Oh, uh, okay," George Sr. said uncomfortably. "Well, like Michael said, we're all concerned about you and…and we want you to be healthy, so…just make sure you eat enough."

"But, we know it might not be easy," Michael said quickly. That was one of the things the book he'd read had advised against saying. "I think it would be good if you talked to a therapist. I can make the appointment for you and go with you if you want. Or, I'm sure everyone else would be happy to go with you, too, if you want. Right?" he said, looking around at his family. They all mumbled their agreement. "Yeah," Michael said, annoyed by this unconvincing display.

"This is ridiculous," Lindsay said. "I'm fine, I've told you so many times."

"Please, just wait," he said.

"Fine," she sighed.

"Thanks. Okay, uh, Buster, do you want to go next?" he said, nervous about getting around to his mother. He'd been uncertain about including her in this, but it would have been even worse if she wasn't there.

"Oh, okay," Buster said nervously. He turned to Lindsay. "I'm worried about you," he said loudly. Michael waited for him to continue, but he seemed to be done.

"Anything else?" he prompted.

"You said that was all I had to say," Buster said, breathing quickly and tugging at his collar, sure signs that one of his panic attacks was coming on.

"Michael, you're making him nervous!" Lucille said shrilly.

"Okay, fine!" he snapped. "Fine. Mom, you go next."

"Alright," she said. "Well, Lindsay, Michael's really worried about you."

"But…you're not," Lindsay said slowly.

"Well, I haven't noticed any weight loss—"

"Okay, that's enough," Michael interrupted. This was not going according to plan. He glared at his mother and turned to Lindsay. "Look, _I'm_ really worried about you. It scares me to death to see you getting so skinny. I know you don't think it's anything to be concerned about, but sometimes it can be hard to recognize when you need help, especially with this kind of thing. I don't want to scare you, but there are serious problems that can come from not eating like this, like heart failure, kidney failure, osteoporosis—"

"Michael, really," Lindsay said.

"Please let me finish. You mean so much to me. To all of us. So, even if you don't think you need to, please just try talking to a therapist, at least once, for my sake."

He searched her face for some sign that he'd gotten through to her. She did look guilty.

"Michael, I know you're worried about me," she said, looking down at the floor. "But really, I don't need to see a therapist." She laughed forcedly.

"Please, just once," he pleaded.

"Sorry, but you're just imagining this whole thing," she laughed.

"I think she's right, Michael," Lucille said gently.

"No, I know I'm not imagining this!" he said desperately.

"I'm going to go," Lindsay said guiltily. Michael looked at her, trying to think of something he could say to change her mind, but he was out of ideas.

"Yeah, okay," he sighed.

"Okay," she said quietly, and got up and left the room.

"Can we go now?" Lucille said.

"Yeah, yeah," he said exasperatedly. As they got up and left he heard the door in the kitchen open. He went into the kitchen and found his older brother taking mustard and parmesan cheese out of the fridge.

"Where the fuck were you?" he said as Gob squirted the mustard onto a plate and poured parmesan cheese on top of it.

"What are you talking about?" he said.

"Lindsay's intervention, where were you?"

He shrugged and ate the mustard and parmesan with a spoon. "It's the first I've heard of it," he said.


	12. Chapter 12

_August, 1986_

Lindsay sat slumped in her bed, flipping through the pages of the new issue of Seventeen Magazine, but she couldn't focus on anything long enough to see if it was worth reading. She closed the magazine and looked at her alarm clock. It was only just past eight. It was too early to go to sleep, but she just wanted this day to be over. She hadn't left the house all day, not even to go to the gym. She'd meant to, but she'd been too tired to do anything. It was the first time she'd skipped exercising since she'd started this diet three months ago. She'd eaten even less than usual to make up for it, but the hunger pangs just put her in an even worse mood and it wasn't enough to get rid of the guilt. She looked at the clock again. There was still time to go swimming, but she didn't want to get out of bed, she was so tired. Tomorrow would be different, she'd get out of the house and do something and she'd exercise extra long to make up for today, but right now she just had to sleep.

As she got up to get ready for bed she heard a knock on her door.

"Come in," she said.

Michael came into her room, carrying a plate of food.

"Hey, I noticed you didn't get any dinner, so I brought you some," he said hopefully.

Lindsay closed her eyes. She couldn't deal with this right now. "I don't want any," she said.

"Are you sure?" he pressed on, ignoring her steely expression. "Rosa made enchiladas, they're really good."

"I already got some," she lied. Their family rarely ate dinner together. Usually their housekeeper cooked something for them and they each got some whenever they felt like it, which had made it much easier for Lindsay to hide how little she was eating.

"No, you didn't," he said.

"How do you know?" she said angrily.

"Because you've barely left your room all day!"

"Well, I did earlier, when I got some dinner," she said icily.

"I didn't see you."

"Have you been waiting in the kitchen all night?"

"Well, no, but—"

"Then I must have gone down when you weren't there," she said simply. He sighed in frustration.

"Do you realize how dangerous this is?" he said.

"Not this again," she groaned.

"I don't know what to do, I just keep waiting for you to stop but you keep getting thinner—"

"Oh my god, do you realize how annoying you're being?!"

"I'm trying to help you!"

"How many times do I have to tell you, _I don't need your help_ , I'm _fine_."

"If you're fine, then why won't you see a doctor?"

"Because there's no need to!"

"You know that's not true."

She buried her face in her hands. "Can you please just go away? I'm tired," she sighed.

"Yeah, wonder why," he said sarcastically. She glared at him.

"Shut up. You don't know how I feel."

He stared at her, taken aback. "I'm trying to understand, I really am," he said earnestly. She closed her eyes.

"If you want to help me, then leave me alone, just be _nice_ to me and stop bothering me about this!" she said, her eyes filling with tears.

"So you can keep starving yourself?!"

"Oh my god, just _go away_!"

"Okay, fine!" he said, and left the room, slamming the door behind him.


	13. Chapter 13

_August, 1986_

Lindsay lay on her bed, listening to the Smiths on her Walkman and staring up at the ceiling. She wanted to go to sleep, her head was aching, but she didn't want to leave her room and risk running into Michael. But only extreme circumstances could cause her to skip her nightly skin care routine, so she would just have to wait until she heard him either go downstairs or go to sleep.

She froze as she heard a knock on her door. She didn't say anything.

"Lindsay?" Michael said. She hesitated, then sighed.

"Come in," she groaned. She glanced up at him as he came into her room, then looked back up at the ceiling. He sat at the foot of her bed.

"Sorry about earlier," she heard him say over the music. "I shouldn't have gotten mad."

She hesitated, then took off her headphones and sat up. As she did, she felt a wave of dizziness. She blinked and waited for it to pass. It did, but she still felt a little lightheaded. That had been happening a lot lately.

"I just don't know what to do," he said desperately. "I don't want you to be mad at me, or to avoid me, but I can't just do nothing. I don't think you realize how dangerous what you're doing is."

She opened her mouth to make some retort, but then closed it. As annoying as he was being, it was hard to be mad at him when he looked so desperate to help her. She remembered the list of potential health problems he'd thrown at her during the intervention. But it wasn't that serious, she hadn't lost that much weight. She sighed and swung her legs off the bed and scooted over to sit next to him. "I think you're overreacting," she said.

"I am not overreacting."

"Well, no one else seems to think anything's wrong, you're the only one—"

Her voice caught as she thought about how little attention everyone else in the family had paid her. Michael had tried several times to convince their parents to make her see a doctor, but their mother maintained that she hadn't noticed any weight loss and their father had been gone for the last two weeks on a 'business trip,' though she suspected he was really off screwing his secretary. She was glad that Michael hadn't had any success in convincing them, of course, but she couldn't help but feel hurt that they seemed to care so little about her. She realized with a dull aching that Michael was the only one who had paid any attention to her, and she'd been pushing him away.

"Sorry," she said quietly, looking down at the floor. "It's just…I'm sorry." She swallowed as a lump rose in her throat and her eyes filled with tears.

"If you talked to a therapist, they might be able to help—"

"Can we please just not talk about that right now?" she interrupted, her voice breaking. "Just for one second can we talk about something else?"

"Yeah, okay," he said. She wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. She felt another wave of dizziness, worse than the last, along with that shaky, clammy feeling that had become familiar to her.

"I, uh…I'm kinda tired, I think I'm gonna go to sleep now," she said, struggling to find the words as the room started spinning.

"Oh. Okay," he said, seeming a little hurt. He got up to leave.

"No, wait," she said guiltily. "You can stay, it's okay."

"It's okay, if you want to sleep—"

"No, really," she insisted, grabbing his arm. "Please stay."

The surprise in his face told her that was a weird thing to say, but her thoughts were too clouded to remember why. She just didn't want him to think she was mad at him.

"Okay," he said, and sat back down.

"Let's just talk," she said, relieved to feel at least some of the dizziness passing. She could do this, she just needed to focus.

"Alright. What do you want to talk about?"

"I don't know," she said, trying to search her foggy brain for something. There wasn't much to talk about, she'd been sitting alone in her room all summer. "We could talk about _Dallas_ ," she suggested, remembering how much fun they'd had watching it together last spring. "The new season's starting next month. We can finally see how Bobby's still alive."

"Oh yeah," he said. "They'd better have a good explanation."

"I read that there are three possible answers, and they taped all three just so the cast and everyone else wouldn't know which was the right one."

"Really?"

"Yeah, it cost them like, thousands of dollars."

"Wow. Did it say what the answers were?"

"Yeah," she said, struggling to remember the article. "One of them was that it was all a dream, which would be terrible."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, that's what I said when I read it."

"You mean him dying was a dream?"

"Not just that, the entire season."

"Ugh," he said indignantly. "That is terrible!"

"I know, right?" she laughed. It surprised her. She couldn't remember the last time she'd laughed. She felt a sudden urge to hug him, or something, she was just so grateful to him for distracting her from her misery, but she couldn't do that, it would be too weird. The dizziness returned again. No, no, she couldn't pass out in front of Michael.

"What were the other two?" he asked.

"Um…one of them was…I think someone, uh…it was an imposter, he got plastic surgery to look like him so he could steal his money or something," she said, swaying slightly and gripping her bedspread as if that would help.

"That's even worse!" he laughed, apparently not noticing the difficulty she was having concentrating.

"Better than the dream one," she said confusedly.

"No, even that would be better, at least it would make sense."

"Yeah, I guess," she agreed, just so she could stop talking. It was taking all her concentration to keep him from noticing how disoriented she was.

"What was the third one?" he asked.

"Um…" she said, distracted by the spots appearing in her vision and the ringing in her ears. "I don't remember." She shouldn't have asked him to stay, she should tell him to leave now, but she didn't want to, she didn't want him to go. "Sorry…sorry I got mad earlier," she said instead.

"Don't worry about it, it's fine."

"I miss you," she said, suddenly needing him to understand. "I just…wanna be alone most of the time right now. It's not because I'm mad or something." It wasn't entirely true, but it should be, she had no reason to be angry when he was only trying to help her.

"It's okay," he said. "Just know that I'm here if you need me."

"I know," she said, her heart breaking as she thought about how she'd been treating him, how she'd always treated him, when he was the only one who cared.

Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew she shouldn't as she leaned against him and rested her head on his shoulder, but she couldn't remember why, and he was so warm and familiar and good. She felt him tense slightly, surprised. She wished he wouldn't, why did he have to make this awkward, when she just wanted to be close to him? But then he was shifting underneath her, and then his arm was around her, and she was wrapping her arms around him and breathing in the warm, clean smell of his shirt, but it wasn't enough, she couldn't get close enough to stop this terrible, empty longing.

"I'm sorry," she whispered as the room spun around her. "You've been so…nice and…I dunno."

"Are you okay?" she heard him say, but his voice was so far away.

"Yeah," she murmured. "Don't…don't worry…"

It felt like she was falling, falling backwards down a long black tunnel, and she was vaguely aware of him moving underneath her and saying her name, but she couldn't anymore, she couldn't keep it from slipping away…


	14. Chapter 14

_September, 1986_

Michael looked out the kitchen window at the gray morning clouds rolling in off the ocean as he waited for Lindsay to come downstairs. It had been almost a month since she'd passed out. He'd panicked and called 9-1-1, which she'd been very angry at him for doing when she woke up shortly after the EMTs arrived. Even worse than the terror of not being able to wake her up was how little she seemed to care afterwards. He remembered the look on her face when she was eating the candy the EMTs had given her to raise her blood sugar, like it was torture. He couldn't understand how she could care more about that than the fact that she'd passed out. She'd never exactly been a reasonable person, but it was still shocking after spending his whole life with her to see her thinking so irrationally.

To his immense relief, the EMTs had convinced their mother to make Lindsay see a doctor the next day. Physical examinations showed that her body weight was only 85% of what it should be and her bone density was abnormally low, and after interviews with her and the family she was diagnosed with anorexia. This finally convinced their parents that she needed help, and when their father returned from his business trip they put her in an intensive outpatient treatment program, which meant that she was now spending four hours a day, four days a week in therapy and nutritionist sessions.

Surprisingly, besides complaining about the amount of time she had to spend there, Lindsay was initially fairly cooperative. But after about two weeks Michael realized she was secretly skipping meals and appointments whenever she could get away with it. Since then he'd taken a much more active role in making sure she ate three meals a day and didn't exercise compulsively. Unfortunately this had put a strain on their already rocky relationship. They were now constantly arguing and she was avoiding him more than ever. He tried not to let it bother him since he knew she was struggling, but it was hard not to feel hurt and somewhat unappreciated. She hadn't once thanked him for doing most of her homework for her so she would have time for treatment, which was particularly difficult since it was on top of the five AP classes he was taking, not to mention college applications.

He wasn't getting any appreciation or support from his parents, either. His father was genuinely trying to help, but he seemed to want to solve the problem by throwing money at it and leaving Michael to do the rest. But he had been helpful in paying for the most expensive treatment facility in the O.C., and having J. Walter Weatherman jump in front of Lindsay's car when she tried to go to the beach instead of therapy. His mother wasn't doing anything to help, but she had at least stopped talking about Lindsay's weight, which was probably doing more good than anything else.

Michael looked up as Lindsay came down the stairs, pulling her hair up into a ponytail as she walked. Lately she'd abandoned her usual elaborate hairstyles for less work-intensive alternatives, though she was still wearing a Swatch watch as a hair band. She looked like she was in a particularly bad mood this morning.

"Did you eat breakfast?" Michael asked her as she walked into the kitchen.

"Yes," she said, rolling her eyes.

"When? I didn't see you."

"Oh my god," she groaned, pushing past him to get to the door. She opened it and stepped outside into the cloudy morning. "Let's go," she said when he didn't move.

"Come on, you've got to eat something."

"I told you, I did," she said through clenched teeth.

"No, you didn't!"

"Why do you have to be so damn controlling?!"

"I'm not trying to be controlling," he said, taken aback. "I just—I want you to get better, I care about you."

"Oh, please," she said poisonously. "You're not doing this for me, you just like to think you're saving me because it makes you feel good about yourself, it's pathetic."

Michael blinked. "That's not true," he said, a little stunned. "Jesus, Linds, that's not true at all."

"Whatever," she sighed, and set off down the pathway. She stopped at the gate and turned around. "Come on," she said impatiently. He hesitated, then followed her down the pathway and through the gate into the driveway. As they wordlessly got into the car he realized she still hadn't eaten breakfast, but he decided it was probably best to just let this one go.

He turned over what she'd said as she backed out of the driveway and drove up the winding road. Things had gotten pretty bad between them but she'd never said something like this. It was hard not to feel angry at her, after everything he'd done for her. He hoped she didn't actually think that and that she was just trying to distract him so she could get away with skipping breakfast.

He looked over at her. Her eyes were fixed firmly on the road in front of them, her expression stony. He thought he saw her eyes flicker over to him for a second, but then she was determinedly staring ahead once again.


	15. Chapter 15

_September, 1986_

Lindsay sat on the couch in the basement, flipping through channels on the TV, but it was difficult to pay attention knowing that her father was upstairs on the phone with her therapist. She'd fainted in school that day. Michael had been gone on a debate trip over the weekend and she only had therapy with its group dinners Monday through Thursday, so she'd used the opportunity to cut her food intake way down, lower than she'd ever done. The result was that she'd fainted in English class when she returned to school on Monday. Carolyn, her therapist, had asked her a lot of questions about it that evening. She'd tried her best to cover up how little she'd eaten, but she doubted she believed her, especially since she suspected Michael was telling her how uncooperative she'd been during her weekly meetings with the family.

The most frustrating part was that she really had tried to stop at first. She'd been determined to prove that she didn't need treatment and to have her evenings free again, but after about a week off her diet she realized it wouldn't be as easy as she'd thought. She missed the feeling of control her food and exercise regimen had given her, and she was terrified of gaining back the weight she'd worked so hard to lose. It started with occasionally skipping a meal when she could easily get away with it and quickly turned into going out of her way to avoid eating without getting caught and giving up entirely on recovery. It scared her a little that she didn't have as much control over this as she'd thought, but she tried not to think about it. She just wanted to stop feeling so miserable all the time and dieting was the only thing that helped.

She hadn't intended to skip her appointments since that was less easy to hide, as they always called her parents when she did. She just didn't have the energy sometimes. At first she'd kind of liked therapy, though she pretended she didn't. She liked telling her therapist all the horrible things her mother had said to her and seeing the genuine shock in her face. Even better was knowing that she was likely talking to her mother about it in her meetings with her. But once she started skipping meals it became exhausting to lie for four hours straight four days a week about how she was trying to recover and she didn't know why she'd stopped gaining weight. But now she was too traumatized by J. Walter Weatherman jumping in front of her car to try that again, so she was stuck. She wished they could see that the appointments were making her feel worse, not better.

She heard someone coming down the stairs and turned to see Michael.

"Hey, can I talk to you?" he asked. He looked nervous.

"Yeah," she said apprehensively. She turned off the TV. He sat down next to her.

"So, Dad wanted me to tell you, they're thinking about putting you in partial hospitalization," he said, not meeting her eyes.

"What? What does that mean?"

"It's, uh, it's every day for eleven hours. You'll still come home at night—"

"That's insane," she said frantically. "I can't—what about school?"

"They have classes there that you'll take instead. I know it sounds bad, but it's usually only two or three weeks."

"You can't make me do this."

"It's not my decision!"

"Well, then, talk to Mom and Dad, they'll listen to you," she said desperately.

"I don't know, Linds, maybe this is what you need! I mean, you're on your own for one weekend and this happens."

"It won't happen again, I promise," she pleaded, her eyes filling with tears. Good, that would convince him. She blinked so that they spilled over and ran down her face. "Just please, please talk to them."

"Okay," he said frantically. "Well, I don't know, I think you need this."

"I don't, really, I'll stop."

"You said that last time and you didn't even try!"

"I did try, okay?!" she said, her voice rising in frustration. "It's just, it's hard, you don't understand. Just please talk to them, I promise I'll stop."

She watched the emotions play across his face, desperately hoping she'd convinced him.

"Okay," he sighed. "But if this happens again—"

"It won't, really," she interrupted. He looked at her tear-streaked face, clearly not sure if he should believe her

"You were trying before?" he asked.

"Yeah," she said quietly.

"Why did you stop?" She looked at him disbelievingly. "You said I didn't understand, I want to understand!"

She shook her head and sighed. "I don't know," she said. "I just don't want to gain back the weight, I guess." She hated how ridiculous it sounded. That wasn't why, at least it wasn't the only reason, but she couldn't explain why she couldn't stop, it didn't even fully make sense to her. "They want me to go past what I weighed before, it's ridiculous," she said instead.

"That's only because you were underweight before. They just want you to get up to a healthy weight, that's all. Are you worried about Mom?" he said when her eyes filled with tears again. "'Cause she's not going to say stuff like that anymore, Carolyn talked to her about it. Hey, it's okay," he said as a sob escaped her throat. She wiped at her eyes, but it was no use, she couldn't keep from crying anymore. He hesitated, then awkwardly wrapped his arm around her. She leaned against him, not caring anymore, it just felt so good to be close to him. "Look, you're really pretty," he said, a little embarrassed. "I don't know why you can't see that."

"Do you really think that?" she choked. She knew how he would answer, but she couldn't help it, she wanted to hear him say it again.

" _Yes,"_ he laughed. "Everyone does, it's an objective fact."

"Thanks," she said quietly. He still didn't understand, it wasn't really about that, but it did make her feel better. It was ridiculous how much she needed this.

"I'm really fucked up, aren't I?" she said.

"No," he said. She looked up at him, eyebrows raised. He laughed. "Well, maybe a little, but we all are. We're just a fucked up family."

"Yeah," she agreed. "At least we have each other."

"Yeah, we do."

She smiled and closed her eyes. This was getting a little weird, she shouldn't say things like that when her head was on his chest and his arm was around her and he'd just finished telling her how pretty she was. But she didn't want to think about that right now, she was just so glad that he was here.

"I really will try to get better," she said. She didn't know if she would feel the same way in the morning, but at that moment she meant it. She wanted to show him that he wasn't wrong to trust her.

She jumped slightly when she heard someone coming down the stairs and pulled away from him. He quickly moved his arm and scooted away from her, and they sat in uncomfortable silence as their mother came into the room.


	16. Chapter 16

_November, 1986_

"So how is your sophomore year starting out?" Michael asked his older brother, who was home for Thanksgiving. The family had just finished watching _Boyfights: The Trip to Disneyland_ after dinner, which Michael had skipped in protest.

"Great," Gob said, leaning back against the couch. "I've been getting really into this magic thing. I'm trying to get Alliance-approved."

"Alliance-approved?" Michael repeated.

"The Magician's Alliance," Gob said, clearly offended. "I told you about it last week on the phone."

"Oh, right, the Magician's Alliance," Michael said quickly. "Of course I remember. What does it mean to be Alliance-approved?"

"Well," Gob said eagerly. "The point of the Magician's Alliance is to make sure that no one reveals a magician's secrets. It's kind of an essential part of being a magician, I mean, if people went around spilling our secrets, where would we be?"

Lindsay smirked from over on the other couch, where she was lying reading a fashion magazine. Michael frowned. She wasn't supposed to read those, as her therapist thought it might contribute to her body image issues. But she had been doing a lot better lately and she seemed to be in a bad mood at the moment, so he decided not to mention it.

"What?" Gob said.

"Nothing," Lindsay said nonchalantly, not looking up from her magazine.

"Well, we'll see who's laughing when my career catches _FIRE!_ " Gob shouted with a flourish of his hands. Liquid squirted out of his sleeves onto Lindsay's sweater.

"What the hell?!" she said angrily, sitting up.

"Oh, that was supposed to be a fireball," he said. "But still, where did the lighter fluid come from?"

"Damn it, Gob, now I have to go change because of your shit magic trick," she groaned, getting up and stalking out of the room.

"She's right," Gob said dejectedly. "I'm a complete failure."

"No you're not," Michael said. "I'm sure with a little practice that will be really cool. You probably shouldn't do it inside, though…"

"You really think it will be good?" Gob said, tearing up a little.

"Yeah, it's a really great trick."

"Illusion. And thank you. You're a good brother, Mikey," he said, hugging him a little too tightly.

"Okay, Gob," Michael laughed nervously, trying to pull away, but Gob wouldn't let him.

"Pie is ready!" Rosa called from the kitchen.

"Oh, listen to that, we'd better go," he said quickly, finally managing to extricate himself from Gob's hug. He quickly went to the kitchen. He'd been a little uncomfortable around his older brother ever since he'd found a picture of himself under Gob's pillow two days earlier when his mother asked him to make his bed to prepare for his arrival.

The family filtered into the kitchen. Lindsay came downstairs wearing a new shirt and a sour expression on her face. She stood next to Michael as they waited for Buster to cut himself a slice of pumpkin pie.

"Careful with that knife, Buster, you're going to cut off your hand!" Lucille said shrilly, taking the knife from him and cutting the slice herself.

"So nice to have the whole family together, isn't it?" Michael said to Lindsay under his breath. She laughed. He smiled to himself. They'd been getting along much better since she started cooperating with her treatment. Her recovery hadn't been completely even, but she had gained back most of the weight and was only going to therapy twice a week now.

Once Lucille finished serving Buster, Lindsay went and cut a slice of pie for herself and put it on her plate. Lucille smirked.

"Well, it looks like we've got the old Lindsay back," she said. "Make sure to leave some for the rest of us, dear."

Lindsay froze.

"Mom!" Michael said angrily. Lindsay set her plate down on the counter and stormed out of the room.

"Well, there's no need to be dramatic!" Lucille called after her. Michael glared at her and followed Lindsay out of the kitchen. He heard a door slam as he climbed up the stairs. He went to her room and knocked.

"Lindsay, it's me," he said, but she didn't answer. He waited for a moment, then decided he should probably leave her alone and went back downstairs.


	17. Chapter 17

_November, 1986_

Lindsay looked in the bathroom mirror as she dabbed makeup remover onto the black circles of mascara under her red puffy eyes. Not an attractive look.

 _Well, it looks like we've got the old Lindsay back._ She clenched her teeth at the memory. What did she have to do to make her stop?! She'd thought it was over, her mother hadn't said anything like that since the hospital visit in August, but now that she was gaining back the weight it was going to start all over again. Her eyes filled with tears of anger and self-pity and shame, because she couldn't help it, she was embarrassed that she'd taken such a big slice of pie, and how pathetic was that? She swallowed and wiped her eyes. She didn't want to cry anymore, she'd spent the last half hour doing that. She just wanted to sleep.

She pulled a hand towel from the rack, ran water over it, and pressed it to her face. As she spread her Sea Breeze lotion around her face she thought about how she'd felt at dinner earlier. It was stressful eating with the whole family, knowing they'd all be watching to see how much she ate, but she'd tried not to think about it and got a little of everything. It was just one meal, it wasn't going to make her gain weight, and she wasn't supposed to worry about that anyway. She'd even felt a little proud of herself.

 _Well, it looks like we've got the old Lindsay back._ She'd just frozen, trying to come up with something say with everyone watching her, all while trying to wrestle with the shock that her mother would still say something like that after everything that had happened. It was ridiculous, she thought as she undressed, that she could still feel surprised after her mother had proven time and time again that she didn't give a shit about her daughter. Why did she keep expecting anything else?

She looked at her body in the mirror and suddenly she couldn't hold back the tears anymore. She pulled on her nightgown and sat on the floor and cried. It was so different from how it had been three months ago. Even then she hadn't been completely happy, but it was better than this. She thought about her stomach, bloated from all the food she'd eaten. What had she been thinking? She felt so sick, she just wanted it out of her, to undo all of it. Before she could change her mind she crawled over to the toilet and shoved her finger into her throat.

She looked at the vomit swirling around in the toilet, her body shaking. She quickly flushed it and leaned back against the wall, disgusted with herself but so wonderfully empty at the same time.

She froze as she heard footsteps outside the door. Had someone heard? She stood up and frantically brushed her teeth. She looked in the mirror. She'd washed off all the makeup but it was still obvious that she'd been crying, her eyes were all red. But it was dark in the hallway, if anyone was out there they wouldn't be able to see. She took a deep breath and opened the door, praying that no one would be there.

Her heart jumped into her throat when she saw Michael. No, no, not him.

"Lindsay," he said, and she knew that he'd heard.

"Hey," she said, trying to keep her voice casual. She walked quickly to her room, looking away so he wouldn't see her eyes. He followed her into her room.

"I heard that," he said.

"Heard what?"

"I heard you throwing up in there."

"Oh yeah, I guess I just got sick or something," she said, sitting on her bed.

"Come on, I know what happened."

"I was just sick, I told you."

"We need to talk about this! If you're relapsing—"

"I'm not relapsing," she interrupted.

"Then what was that?"

She cast around desperately for something to say, but she knew it was no use, there was nothing she could say that would make him believe her. She closed her eyes.

"Please don't tell anyone," she said quietly.

"Of course I won't," he said, sitting next to her on the bed.

"I mean it," she said. "Not Mom, or Dad, or Carolyn…"

Michael hesitated. "Carolyn should probably know about this."

"Don't!" she said frantically.

"I won't tell her, I just think you probably should," he said quickly. "She'll understand, it's her job."

"No," she said firmly. "There's no need to, it won't happen again."

He hesitated. "Alright," he said uncertainly. They sat in silence for a moment.

"I've never done that before," she said.

"Okay."

"Do you believe me?"

"Yeah, I believe you."

"Okay."

Without warning a lump rose in her throat and her eyes burned and then she couldn't keep from crying anymore. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice breaking.

"It's okay, you don't need to apologize," he said, but that just made her cry more. He hesitated, then hugged her. She hugged him back and sobbed, her whole body shaking. She didn't care anymore, it felt so good to cry in front of him and to feel his arms around her and his hand in her hair.

"Don't worry, relapse is really common, it doesn't matter," he said.

"This wasn't a relapse, I've never done that. It's worse than before."

"No, it's not, look at all the progress you've made."

She laughed bitterly through her tears. "What progress?" she said, pulling away from him. "I feel worse than I ever have, it's never been so bad." She didn't know if that was true, but she wanted to say it. "I just feel so miserable all the time, it just doesn't go away."

"It will, you'll get better."

"I don't think I will," she choked. She'd been thinking it for months, that she would never get out of this nightmare, but it was so much more terrifying when she said it aloud.

"You will, don't worry."

"How do you know?" she shot back. She wanted to punch him, he looked so sure of himself.

"I've read all these stories about people who thought they wouldn't get better and they did," he said desperately.

"Well, that's just great," she said sarcastically.

"You seem better than you were two months ago, you seem happier," he said desperately. She gave him a disbelieving look. "Well, not right now, but you have been, you've seemed much better lately. Look, this was just a one-time thing, it doesn't matter. It was just because Mom said that. I'll talk to her and I'll tell Carolyn about it and she'll talk to her, too. Not about this, I'll just tell her what she said," he said quickly when her eyes widened. "Only if you want to me to, though."

She hesitated. "No, I'd rather you didn't," she said.

"Okay, that's fine," he said. "Just, if there's anything I can do, just tell me."

She nodded. She knew he would do anything she asked, but it was hard to feel grateful when he was so infuriatingly certain that he could fix everything.

"Do you want me to go?" he said uncertainly.

She opened her mouth to say yes, but then closed it. Being alone would be even worse.

"No, you can stay," she said. They sat in silence for a moment. She hesitated, then leaned against him. She was glad he didn't seem surprised or embarrassed as he wrapped his arm around her. She was so tired of that. Everyone else was asleep now and the only noise was the sound of the ocean coming in through the open window.

"I thought I was getting better," she said, her voice hollow.

"You are," he said. "Relapse is a part of recovery.

She laughed, though it sounded more like a sob. "You sound like a brochure," she said. "Where'd you get that?"

He laughed. "It was in that book the doctor gave Mom and Dad."

Lindsay smiled to herself. "I bet you read that whole book cover to cover." He didn't respond. She looked up and saw that he was trying not to laugh. "Oh my god, you actually did."

"I also highlighted it."

"No, you didn't."

"Yeah, I actually did," he laughed.

"Oh my god," she groaned, putting her head back on his chest. "That is just…that is such a Michael thing to do."

He laughed. "What does that mean?"

"I don't know, it just seems like something you would do. It's a good thing."

They sat in silence for a moment. She could feel his heart beating under her cheek.

"Thank you," she said. "For everything you've been doing. It's, um, it's really nice to know that someone cares about me."

"We all care about you," he said. She laughed humorlessly. "Really," he insisted. "They're just not very good at showing it."

"Oh, I think Mom's done a pretty good job at showing how she feels about me."

"Yeah, well, Mom's insane. You know that."

She laughed. "Yeah, I guess so."

"She still loves you though, of course she does."

"Yeah," she said, though she wasn't sure she believed him. Her eyes filled with tears again as the full force of how much she needed him crashed over her.

"I love you," she said. She didn't look up at him, feeling a little embarrassed, but she was glad she'd said it.

"I love you, too," he laughed, sounding a little surprised, but she knew that he meant it. Not just because she was his sister and he felt like he should, he really loved her. She was shallow and lazy and selfish but for some reason he loved her anyway.

She wondered vaguely what time it was. He would probably leave soon, they couldn't just sit here all night. The realization filled her with a cold dread. She couldn't bear the thought of being alone again. She looked up at him.

"Michael?" she said quietly.

"Yeah?"

"Can you sleep here tonight?"

As soon as she'd said it she wished she hadn't. His eyes widened.

"I mean, you don't have to, if you don't want to," she said quickly, sitting up.

"Uh, no, it's fine."

"I just don't want to be alone, I guess, that's all," she stammered, her face turning red.

"Yeah, of course," he said. He smiled reassuringly.

"Okay," she said, still regretting asking him, but what could she do now? "Um, do you want to go to sleep now?" she said awkwardly.

"Uh, sure."

"Okay." She paused, not sure how to do this without looking like an idiot. She swung her legs onto the bed, climbed under the blankets and lay down. He hesitated, looking extremely embarrassed, then climbed under the blankets and lay down next to her. She scooted as close to the edge of the twin bed as she could, but their arms were still touching. "Sorry, there isn't much room," she muttered.

"It's fine," he laughed embarrassedly. She smiled weakly and propped herself up on her elbow and turned off the lamp. She lay back down next to him, extremely aware of the fact that she wasn't wearing a bra under her white cotton nightgown. She turned her head and looked at him on the pillow next to her. She could vaguely make out his familiar face in the light that came in from the streetlights outside her window.

"Good night," she said quietly. He smiled.

"Good night," he whispered.

She shivered and smiled shyly back at him. They stared at each other for a moment in the darkness, faces inches apart, neither of them daring to breathe. She knew he felt it, too, the connection running between them.

She turned away and looked up at the ceiling, her heart beating fast. This was a bad idea, this was definitely crossing a line. She rolled onto her side so that her back was to him and closed her eyes. She realized her body was tensed and slowly let herself relax. It was okay, they were only sleeping, there wasn't anything weird about it.

She listened to the sound of him breathing beside her. As awkward as it was, she was glad he was there. It was nice, to feel the warmth of his body next to hers, to know that he would still be there when she woke up in the morning, to know that she wasn't alone, that she was loved and needed and wanted. It felt like she was falling.

She opened her eyes. _Don't,_ she told herself. She exhaled slowly and closed her eyes again, though she doubted she would be able to fall asleep anytime soon, not with her heart pounding like this and the thoughts that were spinning through her head.


	18. Chapter 18

_November, 1986_

Michael sleepily opened his eyes to the pale morning sunlight filtering in through Lindsay's bedroom window. It took him a second to remember why he was in his sister's bed. He turned his head to look at her. She was still facing away from him. She hadn't moved all night. He tried to convince himself that there was no reason to feel the creeping sense of guilt he felt when he saw her sleeping next to him. They hadn't done anything wrong, she'd been upset and she'd asked him to stay with her, so he had. It wasn't like he could have said no. And he didn't want to, he wanted to be there for her when she needed him and to make her feel less alone. They'd slept in the same bed before on family vacations when there was limited space, this wasn't any different.

And it had been nice, aside from the awkwardness. He'd felt so close to her last night. He wasn't sure if it would last. Lately it had seemed like the closer they got the further she pushed him away the next day. But maybe it would be different this time. He hoped so. He'd only just realized how much she meant to him. He wished it hadn't taken a crisis like this to make him see that.

His eyes traveled from her bare shoulders and back under the lacy white straps of her nightgown to the smooth curve of her hips under the pale yellow bedspread. He knew people with her disorder had distorted body images but it was still hard to understand how she couldn't see what a great body she had. He turned away and looked up at the ceiling. That was probably a weird thing to think, especially in a situation like this. But anyone could see that she had a nice body, he was just noticing it. It wasn't like he felt anything for her. Of course he didn't feel anything for her, she was his sister.

"Hey, who took the cap off my fucking Glisten?!" he heard his father say from across the hall. He felt a stab of panic. What if someone came in and saw him there? He didn't know why anyone would come into Lindsay's room at this time, but the thought of trying to explain why he was in her bed was enough to make him want to leave as soon as possible. He tried to climb out from under the blankets without waking her up, but it was difficult when they were so close together.

"Mmm," she murmured, rolling over to face him. Her eyes were still red and puffy from the night before, but she was smiling shyly at him now. "Good morning," she said, laughing nervously. He laughed, too.

"Good morning," he said. "How are you feeling?"

She smiled. "Better. Thanks again."

"Yeah, sure."

They both looked away from each other. An uncomfortable silence hung between them.

"I'm gonna go now," he said awkwardly.

"Okay," she said, sounding relieved.

He got up and quickly crossed the room. He paused for a second when he reached the door, trying to listen for anyone in the hallway. He couldn't be sure, but he didn't want Lindsay to notice his hesitation, so he prayed no one was there and opened the door. He breathed a quiet sigh of relief when he saw that the hallway was empty, quietly closed Lindsay's door, and hurried to his own room.

It was hard not to feel guilty when he was sneaking around like this, but it was just because it would be hard to explain why he was there without embarrassing Lindsay. And he had to admit it would look weird, even though it wasn't, and the horror of any of them thinking for even a second that something inappropriate was going on between them was reason enough to keep the fact that he'd spent the night with her a secret. Still, it was hard to shake the feeling that he'd done something wrong.


	19. Chapter 19

_December, 1986_

Lindsay flipped through the radio stations as she drove to school. The sky was white with morning clouds.

"Whoa, you're swerving!" Michael said.

"Whoops," she said, looking back up at the road.

"Here, let me do that," Michael said, changing the station.

"Hey, go back to that one," Lindsay said when he passed over Madonna.

"Ugh, really?"

"Yeah, I like that song!"

"Fine." He changed it back.

"It's almost over anyway," she pointed out. She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel to the beat. _"True love…"_ she sang. Michael groaned. She laughed and sang louder. _"You're the one I'm dreaming of… Your heart fits me like a glove. And I'm gonna be, true blue, baby, I love you, I love you…"_

"Okay, that's enough," Michael interrupted. She laughed and punched his arm, causing her to swerve again.

"Careful!" he said.

"Oh, damn," she said, righting the car.

"I'll never understand how you got your license."

"Driving is all about confidence," she replied.

"Well, that's reassuring."

The song ended and "Ghost Dancing" by Simple Minds began.

"Much better," Michael said.

"Oh yeah!" she said, turning up the volume. Simple Minds was one of the few bands they agreed upon.

She and Michael had become much closer since Thanksgiving. This was mostly because Lindsay's friendships had all but dissolved in the last few months. She'd been too depressed to socialize since May, and she'd canceled so many plans that her friends just stopped inviting her to things. She hadn't minded at the time since she didn't want to go anyway and it saved her from having to lie about what she was doing every evening while she was in treatment. Everyone at school had probably noticed how thin she'd become, but it still wasn't something she wanted to talk to anyone about. But now that she finally felt up to leaving the house again it was a little lonely. But she was too embarrassed to try to reconnect with her friends after months of barely speaking to them, so she'd been spending all her time with Michael instead. It was a little embarrassing that the only person who wanted to hang out with her was her brother, but she didn't mind it as much as she'd thought she would. She actually preferred him to her friends, with whom she'd always had a rather competitive relationship. It was so much easier to talk to him, and she loved that he genuinely liked spending time with her. She needed someone like that at the moment.

In fact, she was sure the reason her recovery was going so much better was him. Talking to him was the only thing that could distract her when she was obsessing about her weight. And her weight was taking up a much smaller portion of her thoughts now, anyway. Though she would never admit it, she knew the reason was that she was so excited about this change in their relationship. It was strange to feel this way after spending her whole life with him, but something was different between them, something thrilling and confusing that she tried not to think too hard about. She was just glad that she finally felt happy again.

She was still secretly skipping lunch. She'd been doing this since June, sitting in the car reading magazines while Michael thought she was eating with her friends. Lately she'd been forcing herself to eat something occasionally, but most days she didn't. It was hard to motivate herself when no one would know either way. She knew she had to start eating with Michael. It would be much too awkward to try to reconnect with her friends after months of barely speaking to them, and she needed someone to keep her on track. She'd been meaning to do this for a while now, but it was difficult to get up the courage since she wouldn't be able to change her mind afterwards. If she started eating lunch with him regularly he would notice if she started skipping it again. But it would be nice to talk to him in the middle of the day, and she knew she couldn't say she was recovered until she stopped doing this. She wanted so badly for this chapter of her life to be over.

"Michael?" she said.

"Yeah?"

"Can I eat lunch with you today?"

"Uh, yeah, sure," he said, surprised.

"It's just, things have been a little awkward with my friends lately," she explained, feeling a little embarrassed.

"Oh. Sorry about that."

"It's fine, I'm not worried about it," she said quickly. "I just don't want to eat by myself."

"Okay. Well, yeah, that will be fun."

"Thanks," she said, feeling a rush of affection for him. She could tell he really meant it, he was actually excited that she wanted to have lunch with him.

"I love this part," she said, turning the volume up even higher.

"Yeah, me too," he agreed.

" _The car pulled up, the girl she jumped in,"_ she sang along and bobbed her head to the music, her green lightning-shaped earrings dangling.

"Oh no, not again," Michael groaned. She laughed and continued.

" _She said one last kiss while you look across the land_

 _Move me into overdrive, take me by the hand_

 _The car went broke!_

 _The rebels saw smoke!_

 _And they all went to heaven in a stupid fantasy, go!"_

She threw her head back on the last line and laughed.

"Pay attention!" Michael said, though he was laughing, too. Lindsay returned her attention to the road.

" _Take me away…"_ she continued to sing absentmindedly. She saw him smiling at her out of the corner of her eye and felt a fluttering sensation in her chest. _Stop it,_ she told herself.


	20. Chapter 20

_December, 1986_

"Linds, you almost ready?" Michael called up the stairs.

"Almost!" she called back. He sighed exasperatedly. They had planned on leaving fifteen minutes ago. It was their eighteenth birthday and Michael was taking her out to dinner in Santa Monica, wanting to something special to celebrate the progress she'd been making in her recovery. She'd always liked romantic things like that.

Lindsay came down the stairs wearing deep red lipstick and the new red floral dress and leather jacket she'd gotten when their mother had taken her shopping earlier that day. Her hair was curled and tied up with a black cloth headband. She looked like Madonna.

"You look nice," he said.

She blushed, making her look even prettier. He felt his own face grow warm with embarrassment. He didn't know why, he'd said similar things before.

"Thanks," she said, smiling shyly.

"Okay, we'd better go," he said.

"I know, I know," she sighed, following him out the door into the cool wet evening. The sky was deep blue with clouds.

"So where are we going?" Lindsay asked as they walked to the car.

"I told you, it's a surprise."

"Ugh, fine. You do know it's your birthday, too, right?"

"Yeah, I know. This will be fun."

They reached the car and he opened the door for her.

"Well, aren't you a gentlemen?" she teased as she climbed in.


	21. Chapter 21

_December, 1986_

"So what's going on with you?" Lindsay asked her brother. They'd just finished dinner and now they were walking down Santa Monica pier. She couldn't stop thinking about how much this was like a date, but it was sweet that he was trying so hard to make her feel special, and she was having more fun with him than she'd ever had with Andrew.

"What do you mean?" he said.

"Like, what have you been doing lately?"

He laughed. "I think you know everything I've been doing. We kind of live together."

"Yeah, but we never really talk about you."

"Uh, I've been working on college applications, I guess."

"How's that going?"

"Uh, okay. There are so many to do, though."

"How many are you applying to?"

"Twelve."

" _Twelve?"_ she repeated.

"Yeah…" he sighed. "I've finished seven of them, though, so there are only five left."

"Why would you do that to yourself?" she said incredulously.

"I don't know, I just want to have a lot of options."

"Yeah, well, I guess you will."

"Let's hope so," he laughed.

" _Twelve,"_ she said again. "Can you name them all?"

"I think so. Let's see…" He counted on his fingers. "Stanford, UPenn, UC Berkeley, UCLA, uh…University of Virginia, UCSD, UC Davis…University of Michigan, UCSB, UC Irvine, NYU, and UT Austin."

"Oh my god," she said. "Are you sure we're twins?"

"Yeah, pretty sure," he laughed.

"A lot of UC's," she said.

"Yeah, I want the in-state tuition."

"Why? We can afford out-of-state."

"Yeah, but I don't want to be dependent on Mom and Dad any longer than I have to be."

"Oh. That makes sense. Well, I hope you stay in California. I don't want you to go all the way to Pennsylvania or Virginia or whatever."

"Yeah, I'd like to stay close, too. Not in LA, but somewhere on the West Coast would be good. But even if I don't, I'll still visit at least once a year, and I'll call you."

"Yeah," she said, though she still felt hollow at the thought of him leaving. She looked out at the dark waves and wondered if he would be home on their birthday next year. She'd never had a birthday without him. She pushed the thought from her mind. She didn't like to think about him leaving.

"Hey, let's take a picture," she said, remembering the camera she'd brought along.

"Okay," he said as she took the camera out of her blue leather Esprit purse.

"Excuse me," she said to a middle-aged woman passing by them. "Can you take our picture?"

"Sure," she said.

"Thanks," Lindsay replied, handing her the camera. She went over to Michael and stood next to him against the railing. The shiver that ran through her as he put his arm around her waist had nothing to do with the cold December wind coming in off the ocean. She ignored this and smiled for the picture.

"Are you two on a date?" the woman asked kindly when she'd finished taking the picture. Lindsay's eyes widened. Michael quickly let go of her and stepped away.

"Oh, no, we're uh—he's my brother," she stammered.

"Oh!" the woman said. She laughed embarrassedly. "Sorry."

"It's fine," Lindsay said, also laughing. "Thanks for taking the picture."

"No problem," she said and handed her the camera. Lindsay put it in her purse and went back to Michael, who looked even more embarrassed than she was.

"Well, that was a little weird…" she said, trying to lessen the awkwardness.

"Yeah," he agreed, laughing uncomfortably.

"Do you want to open presents now?" she said, trying to change the subject.

"Sure," he said gratefully.

"Okay, let's sit here," she said, walking over to a nearby bench and sitting down. He followed her and sat down next to her.

"Okay, you go first," she said, taking an envelope out of her purse and handing it to him. He opened it.

"Are these Simple Minds tickets?" he said.

"Yes, they're coming in March," she said excitedly. "I got tickets for both of us."

"Wow, that will be amazing!" he said. "Thank you!"

"You're welcome," she said, smiling warmly at him.

"Okay, your turn," he said.

"Okay," she said, taking her own present out of her purse, which she had been carrying it in. She unwrapped it. Her eyes widened when she saw that it was little black velvet box, the kind you would put jewelry in. She opened it and saw that it was a little silver necklace.

"Oh. Wow," she said, surprised. What kind of brother gave his sister a necklace as a birthday present? Her heart beat faster. But it didn't mean that, she knew it didn't. "Thank you," she said, realizing she hadn't said it yet. "Wow, it's beautiful!"

"You like it?"

"Yes, I love it," she said emphatically.

"Oh, good," he said. "I had so much trouble picking it out. Normally I would ask you for help, but since it was _for_ you…" he trailed off. She knew they were both thinking the same thing: that the only other time he would be picking out jewelry would be if he was buying it for a girlfriend.

"Well, I love it," she said, hating to see him feel embarrassed. She looked at the necklace more closely. It looked expensive. She felt a little thrill as she thought of him saving up his banana stand money to buy this for her.

"Here, help me put it on," she said, giving it to him. She turned and pulled her hair up. He put the necklace on her. She shivered as his fingers brushed the back of her neck.

"Thanks," she said when she felt the necklace fall into place.

"Don't forget the card," he said.

"Oh yeah," she said, taking it out of her purse. She opened it and read.

 _Lindsay,_

 _Happy 18_ _th_ _birthday! This past year has been hard, but it's made me realize how much you mean to me. I'm so proud of how far you've come. You're my twin sister, my best friend, and the most important person in my life. I hope you know that._

 _Love,_

 _Michael_

"Oh my god," she said when she'd finished. She felt a little dizzy. "Jesus, Michael, that's just…thank you, wow." She hesitated, then abruptly hugged him. She felt a thrilling breathlessness at the feeling of his arms around her as he hugged her back. "I love you," she said, her voice faltering slightly with embarrassment, but she needed to say it. And it was true, she loved him more than anyone.

"I love you, too," he said. She smiled, her eyes swimming with tears. She pulled away and dabbed at her eyes.

"Damn, I didn't even get you a card," she laughed, her voice a little shaky.

"It's fine," he laughed.

She leaned back against the bench and looked up at the night sky, then down at her hands twisting in her lap, trying desperately to push away the thoughts swirling around in her head. She'd never felt so confused.


	22. Chapter 22

_December, 1986_

Michael looked up at his sister as they walked down the beach. She was looking at the ground, the wind pulling at her hair and her dress. As ridiculous as he found the amount of time and money she spent on fashion, he had to admit he liked the way she dressed. She always looked so cool, and he kind of liked to be seen with her.

He felt a rush of embarrassment as he remembered what the woman who had taken their picture had said. But it wasn't a big deal, it only looked like they were boyfriend and girlfriend because they were the same age and they didn't look like each other for some reason. He had wrapped his arm around her, but that was perfectly normal, everyone did that in pictures. But not all brothers gave their sisters necklaces… God, that was weird. He'd been unsure about it before, but he'd brushed his concerns aside, wanting to do something special to celebrate the beginning of her recovery. A gift card didn't seem like it would cut it. But the look on her face when she'd opened it had instantly told him it had been a bad idea. But she knew it didn't mean anything like that, that he would never… Still, he would try to avoid that kind of thing in the future.

"Do you remember when Andrew broke up with me and you said he was lucky to have me?" Lindsay said suddenly.

"Uh, yeah," Michael said, confused.

"Did you really mean that? Or were you just being nice?" She said it casually but there was an intensity in her voice that startled him.

"Uh, yeah, I meant it, I guess," he said. "Why?"

"I don't know, I was just thinking about it," she said.

"Okay," he laughed, quickly pushing away the thought in the back of his mind. He didn't know if he'd really meant it. It was true that he'd only said it to make her feel better, but she was really attractive. She was also shallow and selfish, but that was just how she was. It was only because their parents had messed them up so much. And she was so fun to be around, and she understood him better than he understood himself. Andrew didn't know her like he knew her, no one did.

"Oh no, I feel raindrops," Lindsay said.

"Oh yeah, me too," Michael said, looking up at the night sky. "Let's head back."

They turned and started walking in the direction of the car.

"Oh, shit," Lindsay said as raindrops started falling all around them. _"Shit!"_

Suddenly rain was thundering down on them. "Come on, over here!" Michael said, running towards the pier. She followed him under it. Raindrops were still coming through the cracks, but it was a little drier.

"Oh my god," Lindsay said. "How are we going to get to the car?"

"Maybe it will clear up soon?" Michael said hopefully, though one glance at the rain pouring down on the beach told him this was wishful thinking. Lindsay shrieked as a river formed in the sand where she was standing and jumped closer to him.

"Okay, we're going to have to make a run for it," she said. "Ready?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, go!"

She pulled her jacket up over her head and took off towards the parking lot. He ran after her, slipping on the wet sand. The rain came down hard on his head as he left the cover of the pier. Lindsay shrieked with laughter, though he could barely hear her over the sound of the rain and the ocean. She stopped when they reached the parking lot.

"Wait, where did we park?" she said as he stopped beside her.

"Oh, uh…I don't remember."

"What?!"

"Well, you don't know, either!"

"You were the one driving!"

"What difference does that make?"

"Oh my god," she said, taking her jacket off her head and looking up at the sky so that the raindrops splashed off her face. "That's just fantastic."

"I guess there's no point in running anymore," Michael laughed. They were both soaked.

"No, not really," she said. "Well, let's find the car."

They walked together through the busy parking lot, which was red and gold with the lights of the cars shining through the rain. Michael scanned the rows of cars, but there was no sign of theirs. It wasn't raining quite as heavily now, but it was still coming down all around them and splashing around their shoes, which were soaked through.

"Hey, is that it?" Michael said, spotting their car in the next row.

"Oh, thank god," Lindsay said. They hurried over to it and got in.

"Oh my _god_ ," Lindsay said as she closed the door, leaning her head back and laughing. "Is my makeup running?"

Michael looked at her. There were indeed long black streaks of mascara running down her face.

"Uh, yeah," he laughed. "Yeah, it's like, all over your face."

"Damn," she said, trying to rub it off.

"It's fine, it's only me," he laughed.

"Yeah, I guess," she said. "Well, happy birthday!"

He laughed. "Happy birthday."

His breath caught in his throat when she looked at him again. She looked beautiful, with raindrops clinging to her eyelashes and her wet skin shining in the orange glow of the streetlights outside. Even the mascara running down her face was kind of sexy in a way. She smiled breathlessly at him for a moment, but then her smile fell slightly and she turned away. He looked away, too, embarrassed, though he wasn't quite sure why.


	23. Chapter 23

_December, 1986_

Lindsay leaned her head back against the headrest and watched the cars flash by out the window, sending up waves of rainwater in their wake. The night sky glowed purple with the lights of the city reflecting on the clouds. She glanced over at her brother in the driver's seat, then pinched the necklace in her fingers and pulled it up off her chest to look at it more closely. It really was very pretty. _You're my twin sister, my best friend, and the most important person in my life. I hope you know that._ No one had ever said anything like that to her before. And why would they? She was a complete mess. There wasn't anything loveable about her. But she and Michael had been together their whole lives, they knew each other better than anyone. She didn't wonder why he loved her, it just made sense. Everything about him made sense. She closed her eyes. She had to stop lying to herself, she knew that she was in love with him.

It felt less like a sudden revelation than an acknowledgement of the obvious, because really, she'd known it for a while. She'd just been too afraid to admit it to herself until now. She didn't want to be in love with him. It was weird and gross, he was her twin brother. But she'd tried and tried not to feel this way about him and it hadn't done any good. As long as she kept it to herself it was okay, wasn't it? She couldn't help it, he was everything she wanted in a guy, he was movie star gorgeous and he did romantic things for her and he was crazy about her. She was sure of that. And he loved her, despite all her flaws he loved her. She'd never really felt happy with any of the guys she dated, and some part of her had always known it was because she was comparing them to Michael. How had it taken so long for her to admit to herself that she felt this way about him?

Of course, she could never tell him. She didn't know how he would react, and she couldn't handle him rejecting her. And even if he didn't, they shouldn't be together. It wasn't healthy, it was disgusting and it could only end badly. She didn't even know if she wanted that. The idea of actually being his girlfriend or something still grossed her out. But she did want him to want that. She remembered what he'd said when she'd started dating Andrew: 'What is he thinking?' But that was almost two years ago, and when Andrew had broken up with her he'd said he was lucky to have her. Of course, he hadn't been very convincing when she'd asked him about it earlier. But if she wasn't his sister, why wouldn't he want her to be his girlfriend? She was pretty and popular and they had so much fun together. She knew she had her issues, but he didn't care about that. It was nothing compared to the connection between them. She knew it was weird to care so much about this, especially when she didn't even want to be with him, but she needed him to feel the same way about her, just so she wouldn't feel like there was something wrong with her, or at least not something he couldn't overlook.

But it didn't matter anyway, because he would never tell her if he had feelings for her. She would just have to try her best to keep this to herself and hopefully someday she would get over him. But she was glad she was done lying to herself. There was no point in continuing to pretend things hadn't changed between them, and that part of her was glad that they had.


	24. Chapter 24

_March, 1987_

"That was amazing!" Lindsay said as she and Michael walked through Hollywood at night. They'd just left the Simple Minds concert.

"Yeah, it was," Michael agreed.

"What was your favorite song of the night?" she asked him.

"Hmm… 'Waterfront' was really good. And 'Don't You Forget About Me,' of course. What about you?"

"I really liked 'Oh, Jungleland,' actually. I didn't realize how good that one was before. So, how was that for a birthday present?"

"Amazing," he said, smiling at her. God, she loved that smile.

In the last three months she'd become much more comfortable with her feelings for Michael. Once the idea had had time to sink in she'd realized it wasn't hurting anyone as long as she kept it to herself, and as messed up as it was, she felt kind of sexy having such a dirty secret. It was thrilling to fantasize about him kissing her, though she was still a little squeamish about picturing anything more than that. He was her twin brother after all.

She was also having fun flirting with him, dropping little hints about her feelings for him and even once 'accidentally' letting her tank top slip down to reveal the lacy edge of her bra while she was talking to him. She'd felt pretty gross after that, but it had been exciting to see his eyes travel downwards and then snap back up when he realized what he was doing. The best part was that she could tell he was just as crazy about her as she was about him. She doubted he was fully aware of it—she had yet to meet someone as good at lying to himself as Michael was—but she could tell that some part of him knew he was attracted to her and loved all the attention she was giving him.

She still wasn't planning on telling him how she felt, but as time went on it became more and more frustrating that nothing would ever come of this. But she knew she had to accept that. She couldn't imagine it ending in anything but disaster. But for the most part she was content to let things continue the way they were and just enjoy the thrilling sensation of constantly being on the edge.

"Oh my god, look at that dress!" she said, seeing a short black velvet dress in the window of one of the stores they were passing.

"Oh yeah," Michael said distractedly.

"That would be perfect for prom, it's exactly what I've been looking for!" she said. "Come on, I have to go get it."

"Oh, come on, Lindsay," Michael complained.

"It will only take a second!" she insisted, hurrying over to the door.

"Oh, look, it's closed anyway," he said, pointing at the sign.

"Damn," she said. "Okay, but I'm coming back tomorrow. Isn't it perfect?"

"Yeah," Michael said unconvincingly. "Don't you think it's a little short?"

"Short is in, Michael."

"Well, if you want to dress like a hooker I guess that's up to you."

She gaped at him. "Shut up!" she laughed. She flashed him a smile. "Like you don't love it when I wear short dresses."

The smile slid from Michael's face. Lindsay blushed, realizing too late what an inappropriate thing that was to say.

"Uh, what?" he said, laughing nervously.

"Sorry," she said quickly. "So, you liked the concert?"

"Uh, yeah," he said, looking very confused. "Yeah, it was great."

"Great," she said, forcing a smile.

What had she been thinking? Of course, that had been a weird thing for him to say, too. He'd always seemed a little uncomfortable with the way she dressed, probably due to a mixture of jealousy and an inability to ignore his attraction to her when she wore revealing clothes. She kind of liked that, as she loved any kind of evidence that he was attracted to her, too. But pointing it out was not okay, what was wrong with her?


	25. Chapter 25

_April, 1987_

Lindsay sat on the floor of her room and leaned against her bed as she painted her nails neon yellow and listened to music on her Walkman. Late afternoon sunlight came in through the window. She heard a knock on the door.

"Come in," she said. Michael opened the door and came into the room.

"Hi," she said cheerfully, taking off her headphones.

"Hi," he said. He sat on the floor next to her. "Uh, this is kind of embarrassing, but as you know, prom is in a week, and I don't really know how to dance, so I was wondering if you could teach me?"

Lindsay's heart skipped a beat. "Uh, yeah, sure," she said. She blushed, realizing she may have sounded a little too eager. "I just need to wait for my nails to dry," she added.

"Okay, thanks," he said. He leaned against the bed. "What are you listening to?"

"New Depeche Mode song," she said. "Here." She put the headphones on him, careful not to get nail polish in his hair.

"It's good, huh?" she said.

"Yeah, pretty good," he agreed.

"So, do you just want to learn how to slow dance?" she asked, struggling to keep her voice casual as she pictured dancing with him.

"Yeah, that's all," he said.

She laughed. "You really don't know how?"

"No, I said it was embarrassing. I just figured I'd rather make a fool of myself in front of you than Lisa."

Lisa was Michael's date to the prom, a pretty girl who was among the few people in the school taking as many AP classes as he was. It was hard not to feel a little jealous, but she knew Lisa didn't mean anything to him. At least he wasn't going with Sally Sitwell. He had asked her, but she'd turned him down since she was already going with someone else. This was an immense relief to Lindsay, who'd always been annoyed that Michael was so infatuated with her rival. Lindsay was going with Roger Danish, one of the most popular guys in school and a senior, allowing her to go to the senior prom. A few months ago she would have been thrilled to be his date, but now all she wanted was to go with Michael. If anything her feelings for her brother had only gotten stronger since their birthday.

"Well, I'm happy to help," she said, hoping he couldn't tell just how happy she was. "Don't worry, it's really easy."

"Good," Michael said. "Oh, and can you not tell Gob about this? I'll never hear the end of it."

"Sure," she laughed.

Gob had moved back in two weeks earlier after dropping out of college to pursue his dream of becoming a magician. George Sr. was furious with him and had been taking every opportunity to criticize him and praise Michael, seeming to hope it would convince him to go back to college. So far all it had succeeded in doing was driving an even bigger wedge between Michael and Gob. Gob was constantly picking fights with him now. Though Michael claimed to be angry that their father was continuing to pit them against each other, Lindsay suspected he was somewhat pleased that he finally seemed to have won the competition for their father's approval he had fostered between them since they were little kids.

"Okay, I think my nails are dry now," she said. It wasn't true, but they were dry enough that she wouldn't get nail polish on his clothes, and she couldn't wait anymore. She could fix them later if they got messed up. "I'll put on some music," she said, getting to her feet and crossing the room to her tape collection. She looked through her tapes, trying to choose the perfect song. She settled on "Mandolin Rain" by Bruce Hornsby. It was missing the beginning since she'd recorded it from the radio, but it was so romantic. She put it in and pressed play.

She walked back to where Michael stood. She hesitated, a little nervous, then abruptly draped her arms around his neck. He took a small step back, startled. She blushed. Well, what had he expected?

"Put your hands on my waist," she instructed, struggling to keep her voice steady. She hoped he couldn't tell how nervous she was. He looked pretty nervous himself, probably realizing too late how awkward this would be. He gingerly put his hands on her waist. She shivered at his touch. "Now you just step back and forth, like this," she said, demonstrating.

"Okay," he said, imitating her. She noticed he was determinedly avoiding her eyes.

"And that's pretty much it," she said.

"Oh," he said, surprised. "I thought there was more to it than that."

"I told you it was easy," she laughed.

She realized they could probably stop now that there wasn't anything more to teach him, but she wasn't ready to yet, they'd barely started.

"Lisa will be impressed," she said, hoping that if they started talking it wouldn't be so noticeable that there was no reason to continue.

Michael laughed. "Yeah, let's hope so."

"She's a lucky girl," she said before she could stop herself.

"Thanks," he said, surprised. She thought she saw a flicker of excitement in his eyes. "Roger's a lucky guy," he added. Her heart leapt.

"Thanks," she said, imitating him. He laughed.

They continued to step back and forth to the music. A warm breeze came in through the window. She took his hand from her waist, pulled it into the air, and did a twirl, finishing with their arms extended.

"Wait, this is getting more complicated," Michael said.

She laughed. "Relax, you won't have to do this," she said as she twirled back to him, getting caught up in the music. "This is just for fun."

"Oh, okay," he laughed. They were much closer now. She smiled warmly at him. A little shiver went through her when he smiled back.

Her heart was still pounding madly but she wasn't nervous anymore, just caught up in the closeness between them and the certainty that he was just as electrified as she was. He laughed as she pulled his hand into the air again and turned gracefully on one foot, the skirt of her dress fanning out around her legs. As the room spun around her she was overcome with a breathless excitement, and before she could change her mind she pulled in close to him, so close that their faces were inches apart.

The smile slid from his face. She stood frozen, shocked at her own boldness. They weren't dancing anymore, just standing there with her arms around his neck and his hands on her waist.

"Do you like her?" she said quietly. She knew she shouldn't, but all she could think about was the fact that he wasn't pulling away.

"Uh…I don't know," he said, his voice barely above a whisper.

"She's pretty."

"Yeah, I guess."

She hesitated, her heart pounding madly.

"Prettier than me?"

His mouth opened slightly. She watched the emotions play across his face as she struggled to breathe. A slight smile flickered on his lips.

"No," he whispered.

Her breath caught in her throat. _Don't, don't, don't,_ she told herself, trying desperately to remember all the reasons why she shouldn't, but she could see it in his eyes, she knew that if she leaned in and kissed him he wouldn't pull away.

Suddenly the door opened and Gob came in.

"Hey, Lindsay—whoa."

They sprang apart like they had been scalded.

"Don't you knock?!" she said angrily. Gob's eyes widened. "I was just teaching him how to dance," she said quickly, realizing how that must have sounded. She remembered too late that Michael had asked her not to tell him about this, but she was sure he would rather Gob think that than the alternative. She expected Gob to make fun of him, but instead he looked suspiciously from her to Michael.

"What did you want to talk to me about?" she asked, her heart pounding.

"Uh, Mom wanted me to ask you if you'd seen her elephant brooch."

"Oh, uh, no, I haven't," she said. She didn't dare look at Michael, but judging from his silence he was even more stunned than she was.

"Okay, I'll tell her," Gob said. He opened his mouth as if he was about to say something else, but he seemed to think better of it and turned and left the room. They stood in silence for a moment, staring at the floor, then hesitantly looked up at each other.

"I think that's enough," Michael said shakily.

"Yeah," Lindsay agreed.

"Okay," he said awkwardly, and hurried out of the room.


	26. Chapter 26

_May, 1987_

Lindsay looked in the mirror of her vanity as she meticulously curled her hair, which had fallen slightly flat since her trip to the salon. It was prom night and she wanted to look perfect.

"Hey, Linds," she heard Michael say. She turned to see him standing in the doorway in his tux.

"Hello, handsome," she said. She smirked at the look of surprise on his face.

"Uh, hi," he said, laughing embarrassedly. "Thanks."

She laughed and set the curling iron down on the desk. "How do I look?" she asked, standing up and spinning around so that her black velvet dress fanned out around her legs, dangerously high. She had ended up getting the dress they'd seen the night of the concert.

"You look nice," he said.

"That's not a very descriptive word," she said teasingly.

"It's the only word I'm comfortable using," he laughed, not meeting her eyes.

She smiled flirtatiously at him. "Try to overcome the discomfort."

He laughed and shook his head. "Okay, you look beautiful," he said. "How's that?"

"Better," she said. She sat back down and resumed curling her hair. He sat on the bed.

She'd gotten a little bolder since they'd danced together. She still couldn't believe she'd almost kissed him, after telling herself so many times that she would never do anything, but it was hard to be mad at herself when she was so distracted by the fact that he would have kissed her back. She was sure he would have, she could just tell. She still wasn't planning on telling him how she felt. He might feel the same way, but she couldn't imagine them actually being together. It would probably end in disaster, and even if it didn't it would change their relationship forever, and she wasn't sure she wanted that. She was crazy about him, but the thought of him actually being her boyfriend was still a little too weird for her, though there was some appeal in the wrongness of it.

She was still trying to figure out what he thought about all of this. She didn't know how he could continue to ignore his feelings for her after last week, but this was Michael. He had seemed very nervous around her for the rest of that day and she suspected he'd been avoiding her, so some part of him must have realized what had almost happened, but now things were back to how they'd been before like nothing had happened. She was glad they were, as she didn't want him to avoid her, but she also wished he would admit to himself that he was in love with her.

"So, are you excited?" she asked him.

"Yeah, I guess."

"That wasn't very convincing."

"Yeah. Prom's not really my thing, I guess."

"I guess Lisa's not really your thing, either."

"No, she's fine," he said, surprised.

"Also not very convincing," she teased.

"No, really," he protested. "I'm lucky to be going with her."

"Okay, okay, I believe you," she laughed. She set down the curling iron and tousled her hair with her fingers. She noticed Michael watching her in the mirror and smiled to herself.

"You're wearing the necklace I gave you," he said.

"Yeah, I wear it everyday."

"I know, but I thought for the prom you'd want to pick something out yourself."

She turned to him and smiled. "No, I like this one," she said.

"I'm glad you like it," he said, smiling back. He stood up. "Well, I'd better go," he said, suddenly embarrassed. "Don't want to be late."

"Okay, see you there," she said.

"Yeah, see you," he said as he left the room.


	27. Chapter 27

_May, 1987_

Michael looked nervously around the hotel ballroom, hoping Lisa wouldn't ask him to dance. He'd been so embarrassed about asking Lindsay to teach him that he'd convinced himself all he needed to learn was slow dancing, but what would he do if she asked him now? He looked back at Lisa, who was standing next to him at the edge of the room, and tried to come up with something to fill the silence, which was starting to become noticeably long. They'd really hit it off when they were working on a physics project together. Was there something he could say about that?

"How did the AP Physics test go?" he asked. He realized too late that that might have been a rude question.

"Oh, um, not that well," she said. _Damn it,_ he thought.

"Oh, that's too bad. Well, I'm sure you did well on the other ones," he said. Did that sound condescending?

"Yeah, Spanish and Calc went pretty well," she said. "What about you, how did your physics test go?"

"Uh, okay," he said. It actually had gone pretty well, but he didn't want to say that after she'd said hers hadn't.

"Oh, well, you probably won't need physics credit anyway. You're going to major in business, right?"

"Uh, yeah. Yeah, you're probably right." He couldn't help but feel a flicker of annoyance. He'd said it had gone okay, not badly. He was pretty sure he was going to earn college credit for it.

He saw Lindsay and her date enter the room. Her simple black dress stood out among the sea of ruffles and metallics. She smiled when she saw him and gave him a little wave. He smiled and waved back.

"Who are you waving to?" Lisa asked, looking over her shoulder.

"Oh, just my sister. Hey, do you want to go talk to her and Roger?" he asked, thinking it would be easier to talk to Lisa in a group. For some reason she looked uncomfortable with the suggestion.

"Her?" she said.


	28. Chapter 28

_May, 1987_

"So, how is your night going so far?" Lindsay asked her brother. They were sitting at a table with their dates. Lindsay had been careful to sit next to Michael when the four of them sat down.

"Good," he said.

"Well, you look gorgeous."

"Thanks," he said, a little embarrassed.

"How do I look?" she asked. He laughed.

"Nice."

"You bastard," she teased.

"Is that like an inside joke or something?" Lisa said.

"Oh yeah, it's uh, it's just something we said earlier," Michael said, seeming to just remember that she was there. Lindsay smiled to herself. As bad as she knew it was, she was thoroughly enjoying distracting Michael every time Lisa tried to talk to him just to show her who he was really interested in.

"Hey, Lindsay, do you want to go dance?" Roger asked her.

"Not yet," she said, turning back to Michael.

"I love your dress, by the way," Lisa said to her before she could talk to Michael again.

"Thank you," Lindsay said. "Michael doesn't agree."

"What?" Michael said. "Oh yeah," he laughed embarrassedly. "I didn't mean that I didn't like it, I just…never mind."

"You just what?" she said flirtatiously. He laughed and shook his head.

"Let's go dance," Lisa said suddenly.

"What? Oh, okay," Michael said, getting up and following Lisa, who was already stalking away.


	29. Chapter 29

_May, 1987_

Michael clenched his teeth as he watched Lindsay and Roger dancing, though it was really more of an extremely tight embrace. They were barely even moving, just swaying slightly to the music as Roger's hand moved progressively lower on her back. Who did he think he was, doing that in front of everyone, including her brother? And why was Lindsay letting him? And wearing that short dress…

"You and your sister are really close, huh?" Lisa said.

"What? Oh, uh, yeah, I guess," Michael said, suddenly remembering that he was dancing with her. "Well, you know, we're twins."

"It seems like you really care about her," she said, her tone inexplicably frosty.

"Oh. Well, I do."

"I can tell."

"Oh. Yeah." He didn't know why she looked so annoyed. Wasn't it a good thing to care about your sister?

"Do you have any siblings?" he asked, making a desperate stab at conversation.

"No."

"Oh."


	30. Chapter 30

_May, 1987_

Lindsay rested her head on Roger's shoulder and closed her eyes. A year ago she would have been thrilled to be here at the senior prom, dancing with one of the most popular guys in school. She would have convinced herself that she was in some fairytale romance and the fact that his arms were wrapped so tightly around her would have made her go crazy. But instead she felt nothing.

The whole night had been like this. She'd been on autopilot, trying her best to seem fun and sexy like she always had in situations like this, but it had never felt like so much work. As soon as she'd started talking to Michael she'd completely forgotten about her date. After he left she realized Roger seemed annoyed and slightly creeped out that she seemed to be more interested in her brother than him. She'd been extra flirtatious to try to make up for it, but as the night wore on she found herself caring less and less what he thought of her.

She scanned the crowd for Michael. She saw him across the room dancing with Lisa. He looked like he was enjoying himself even less than she was. She wished she could be there with him, her arms draped around his neck, his hands on her waist, him looking at her like she was the most beautiful girl in the room. Suddenly it struck her how ridiculous this was. Here they were, struggling to impress people who didn't know them, didn't care about them, when the person who loved them more than anyone was right there across the room. She didn't care anymore, she knew she wanted to be with him.

It didn't even feel wrong anymore. She'd been trying to convince herself that she still knew it was messed up, but the truth was that some part of her had always felt like they would be together someday. She knew he felt the same way, that there was something inevitable about them. He may not have accepted it yet, but someday he might, and if he did she knew how she would respond. She had to be with him, she could never be happy with anyone else.


	31. Chapter 31

_May, 1987_

Michael continued to dance with Lisa, who had lapsed into an icy silence. He had no idea why she seemed so annoyed at him. He wondered if Lindsay was enjoying herself more than he was. For the hundredth time he looked over to where she was dancing with Roger and saw that she was looking at him, too. His mouth went dry as their eyes met. Even at this distance he could see the longing in her eyes. She gave him a small, sad smile. He smiled back.

"Okay, what is going on between you and Lindsay?" Lisa said suddenly, pulling away from him.

"What?"

"My friends told me there was something weird about you two and I didn't believe them, but you've been looking at her all night and it's starting to creep me out."

"There's nothing—she's my sister!" Michael stammered. "Who's saying that?"

"Everyone is, and I'm starting to think they're right. The way you two act around each other is seriously messed up."

"Jesus, what is wrong with you?"

"What's wrong with _me_?"

"Look, there is nothing going on between me and Lindsay, so you can tell all your friends that."

"Whatever, I'm so done with this," she said.

"Fine!" he said angrily as she turned on her heel and stalked away.


	32. Chapter 32

_May, 1987_

"Whoa, it looks like Michael and Lisa had a fight," Lindsay said, watching Michael storm out of the room. She pulled away from Roger. "I'm going to go see what happened."

"Seriously?" he said.

"It will only take a second!" she said over her shoulder as she hurried away. She wove through the crowd to the doors, opened them and went out into the hallway. She saw Michael at the end of it.

"Michael!" she called after him. He turned around.

"Oh, hi," he said. She hurried over to him, her heels clicking on the marble floor.

"What was that about?" she asked when she reached him.

"Oh, you saw that?"

"Yeah, what happened?"

"Uh…I don't really want to talk to you about it."

"Oh," she said, slightly hurt. She sat down on a nearby bench. Michael sat next to her. "Wait, me specifically?"

"Yeah…"

"Why? Was it about me?"

"Uh, yeah, it actually was."

"It was?" she repeated. "Well, now you have to tell me!"

"I'd really rather not…"

"Michael!"

"Ugh, fine," he groaned. "It's just, it's kind of awkward. Okay, apparently she—and everyone else, I guess—apparently some people think there might be something…inappropriate going on between us."

"Oh," she said. "Oh my god."

"Yeah," he said, laughing weakly. "Crazy, right?"

"Yeah, crazy… Who's saying that?"

"I don't know, she just said everyone."

"Oh my god," she said again. What had she been thinking, flirting with him so openly in front of everyone earlier? She realized she'd kind of wanted people to know that Michael had feelings for her without really thinking about what that would mean. She kept forgetting that other people would think their relationship was disgusting. Also discouraging was how freaked out Michael seemed to be. "Well, screw them," she said. "Who cares what they think? Really," she said when he looked unconvinced. "We're close. There's nothing wrong with that. If they want to make it into something it's not, that's their problem."

"Yeah, I know," he said.

"Good," she said simply.

"I _can_ understand why some people might think that, though," he said, looking extremely embarrassed. "You know, with the way we act sometimes."

"What do you mean?" she laughed.

"Uh, well, you know," he said, his face turning red. "Like, when you sat down you touched my leg." She raised her eyebrows. "Now, _I_ know there's nothing weird about that," he said quickly. "But other people might not get that, so…maybe we should try to avoid that kind of thing when we're in public."

"Okay, got it," she said. "No touching."

"Right," he laughed. There was an awkward silence. He laughed again. "So how is _your_ night going?"

"Uh, better than yours, but not by much."

"Really? Why not?"

"I don't know. I just don't know Roger very well, so it's not that fun. He's kind of pissed at me, too, actually. I sort of ditched him to come talk to you."

"Oh. Thanks. You should go back, I'm fine."

"No, I don't really want to," she said, smiling warmly at him. He smiled back. She leaned back against the bench and sighed. "You wanna go home?"

"Yes," he said immediately.

She laughed. "Okay, let's go," she said, getting up. Michael stood up, too.

"What about Roger?" he said.

"Oh yeah…it doesn't matter, let's just go."

He laughed. "You should probably at least tell him you're leaving so he's not looking for you."

"Ugh, fine," she groaned. "I'll go find him, you wait here."

"Okay," he said as she left.


	33. Chapter 33

_May, 1987_

Michael sat on the bench in the hallway, unsuccessfully trying not to think about what Lisa had said. Was it really that obvious? It wasn't fair, they hadn't even done anything. He hoped people wouldn't see them leaving together. Of course, she was telling Roger. But obviously it was because they lived together, no one would think anything else. He looked up at the sound of the door opening.

"Did you find him?" he said as Lindsay walked down the steps toward him, her dress swishing around her long legs.

"Yeah," she said. "He's not too happy with me."

Michael laughed and got up. "I feel kind of bad for him," he said as they walked down the hallway together, though he couldn't help but feel a little smug.

"Yeah…" she said. She laughed. "Maybe he and Lisa will end up together. They can bond over how the Bluth twins went home with each other instead of them."

Michael looked up at her. "Why do you have to say it like that?"

"It was just a joke!"

"Well, I know that!"

"Okay, okay, sorry," she said. "You're really freaked out by this, aren't you?"

"Well, yeah."

"Don't worry. Most people probably don't believe it anyway."

"Yeah, you're right," he said, hoping it was true.

"Of course I am. So let's just forget it happened and move on."

"I'm all for that," he agreed.

They reached the entrance and stepped out in the cool night air. He could faintly hear the music coming from inside, mixing with the sound of the waves behind the hotel. He looked cautiously up at his sister. She really did look beautiful that night with her black dress contrasting with her pale skin and her blonde hair pulled up to reveal the smooth line of her shoulders and neck. He had to accept it, this was getting ridiculous. He couldn't keep telling himself that he wasn't in love with her.

No, he was attracted to her, and he loved her as a sister, but he was not in love with her. But he was definitely attracted to her, he had been since middle school. He'd known she felt the same way about him even longer. He'd spent the last several years trying not to think about it and hoping it would go away. He'd even managed to mostly push the fact that he'd almost kissed her last week when they were dancing from his mind. But he couldn't stay in denial anymore, the whole school knew, for god's sake.

He hated that he felt this way about her. It was disgusting and perverted, and it was yet another example of him trying to be different from his family and failing. Incestuous thoughts seemed to be something of a default in his family, something he'd always been somewhat aware of and embarrassed by. He liked to think that he was different from them. He knew he had his issues, but he wasn't quite as bad as them. But here he was, hopelessly in love with his sister. Jesus Christ, was it genetic?

Still, he couldn't help but be glad that she seemed to feel the same way. It made him feel at least a little less crazy. And if he was being honest with himself, he wouldn't be able to handle it if he felt this strongly about her and she felt nothing in return. And it was flattering that someone as beautiful and popular as her was attracted to him, especially after all the times she'd made fun of him. Of course, the only reason was that she was so insecure. He was just there, he was nicer to her than anyone else in her life, which wasn't exactly a high bar, and she could probably tell that he was attracted to her and it made her feel good about herself. There wasn't anything special about him.

But even as he told himself this he knew there was more to it than that. Her insecurity was certainly part of it, but it was also because he was the only one who had been there for her when she'd needed him. And even before that, there had always been a deep connection between them. Something about them just made sense.

He stopped himself. There was nothing beautiful or romantic about this, it was disgusting. It was good that they were so much closer than they used to be and he was glad that he'd seemed to help her when she was feeling alone, but that was separate. Their attraction to each other just poisoned what they had and turned it into something ugly. He had to try to forget this and move on, there wasn't any other option.


	34. Chapter 34

_July, 1987_

The Bluth family sat on the beach in silence. It was the Fourth of July and they'd gone to Huntington Beach to watch the fireworks, but none of them were feeling particularly conversational as they waited for them to start. Michael, meanwhile, was preoccupied with trying not to notice how pretty Lindsay looked sitting next to him on the picnic blanket in her short, low-cut dress. He was sure he wasn't imagining it, she was definitely wearing more revealing clothes when she was around him now.

"Mom, can I swim in the ocean?" Buster asked.

"Absolutely not," Lucille said.

Michael jumped slightly as Lindsay leaned in close to him and whispered in his ear, "You wanna get out of here?"

"Uh, where do you want to go?" he said quietly, his heart beating quickly.

"Doesn't matter," she said. "We could just walk down the beach a little ways."

"Okay," he said before he could stop himself.

"Great," she whispered. She stood up. "We're going to walk down the beach," she said to the rest of the family as Michael stood up, too.

Lucille raised her eyebrows. "Alright," she said.

Lindsay started walking away. Michael followed her, glancing nervously back at his parents. Lately their mother had been making less and less subtle remarks about how close they were, and he was starting to worry she suspected something was going on between them. Which wasn't true, he thought angrily, they hadn't done anything. But Lindsay wasn't helping when she did things like this in front of everyone. Gob had also seemed a little suspicious ever since he'd walked in on them dancing together. Thankfully their father didn't seem to have noticed anything.

"Don't you just love our family celebrations?" Lindsay said sarcastically when they were out of earshot. Michael laughed. "Ugh, I can't believe you're leaving next month and I'll be stuck with them for another year."

"Sorry," he said guiltily. Lindsay hadn't been very subtle about her jealousy that he was going to college and she wasn't. He'd told her, though, he'd tried to convince her to go to summer school instead of repeating ninth grade and she hadn't listened. Still, it was hard not to feel guilty. "It's just one more year, and then you'll be done, too," he pointed out.

"Yeah, but it's going to be torture without you," she said. "Just me and Gob and Buster and Dad and _Mom_."

He laughed. "Yeah, it's going to be bad. I'll call you every day, though, it will be like I'm still here."

"Good," she said. "You'd better."

"Of course I will," he said, and he meant it. He was excited about going to college, but he wasn't quite ready to leave his twin sister behind. In some ways it was a good thing. He was hoping that living apart would help him get over his feelings for her. But he would miss her. It was hard to imagine only seeing her on the holidays after they'd spent their whole lives together. Even worse was the fear that she would relapse when he was gone. She was only going to therapy once a week now and for the first time since middle school she looked healthy, but he couldn't shake the fear that she would spin out of control when she didn't have him there to support her anymore.

"So have you thought about where you're going to go next year?" he asked.

"Not really," she said. "Maybe Boston."

"Boston?"

"Yeah, why not?"

"Nothing, it's just…why Boston? Is there a specific college there you want to go to?"

"No, I just want to go somewhere different from here. There are a lot of colleges there, right?"

"Well, yeah, but you should probably find a specific one you're interested in," Michael said, a little frustrated by her indifference toward her future, and slightly hurt that she would want to go somewhere so far away. "We wouldn't see each other much if you went there," he pointed out.

"Aww, would you miss me?" she teased.

He rolled his eyes. "Yes, I would miss you," he said. She smiled at him.

"I won't, then," she said. She stopped and sat down a piece of driftwood. He sat next to her. "Maybe I could go somewhere near you," she said. "Are there any colleges near Berkeley that I could get into?"

"Uh, not that I know of, but I'm sure there are. That would be great."

"Yeah, it would be," she said, and he loved the way her eyes lit up when she said it. "We could take turns visiting each other every weekend and go to parties together. Yeah, I really like this idea."

"Me, too," he said, though he felt a little uneasy picturing them alone in a dorm room without their parents in the next room. But a year would probably be enough to get over her, and it would be nice to see her more. And he couldn't help it, he loved how excited she seemed to be about the possibility of living near him again. "Okay, I'll look through my college guide when we get home and find something for you," he said.

"Great," she said, looking out at the waves. "Yeah, I'd feel a lot better about you leaving. I just have to get through one more year with Mom and then it will be just the two of us in San Francisco, or wherever the college you find is."

 _Just the two of us,_ he thought. "Sounds good," he said.

She smiled. "Yeah, it does."

 _CRACK!_

"Oh, look!" she said, looking up at the sky as the fireworks exploded above them. Michael just kept watching her as her beautiful, familiar face glowed red in the light of the fireworks, and though he kept telling himself he was just confused, all he could think was, _I love her._

She glanced over at him. Her eyes widened slightly when she saw that he was looking at her, and then her red lips spread into a teasing smile. He turned away, embarrassed. He looked up at the sky and pretended to watch the fireworks, though he was too distracted by the feeling of her watching him to pay any attention to them. He saw her move in his peripheral vision and then he felt her hand on his. He froze. This was not okay, she knew that. He glanced nervously at the other people on the beach a few yards away. Of course, they didn't know they were brother and sister, but still. She tried to lean against him, but he stood up and pulled his hand away.

"Maybe we should go back now," he said shakily, his heart pounding.

"Oh," she said, blushing. "Okay."

She stood up and they walked back down the beach in silence. He glanced over at her. She was determinedly looking down at the sand, her jaw set. She looked like she might cry. He turned away guiltily. He wanted to apologize, but that would mean acknowledging what had happened, so he didn't say anything.


	35. Chapter 35

_August, 1987_

"So how does it feel to be leaving home tomorrow?" Lindsay said, leaning over the concrete wall that wrapped around the roof of the Bluth Company building. To celebrate Michael leaving home they'd stolen some of their mother's vodka and sneaked up there to watch the sunset, using the code Lindsay had gotten by discreetly watching their father enter it in on 'Bring Your Daughter to Work Day.'

"Good," Michael said. "I'll miss you, though."

"Aww, thanks," she said, her words a little slurred. "You don't need to pretend you're not excited, though, I can handle it." She bent down and picked up the bottle of vodka from the ground, then stood back up and refilled her cup. "You want some more?" she said, offering him the bottle.

"No, thanks."

"Come on, you've barely had any!"

"No, I don't want to be hungover on my first day there. Plus one of us needs to drive back."

"Ugh, why d'you have to be so damn responsible?" she groaned. "No reason why I shouldn't though. Cheers!" she said, taking a drink.

Michael laughed. "Maybe you should slow down a bit."

"No, I'm drowning my sorrows," she laughed. She smiled sadly at him. "I don't want you to leave," she said more seriously.

"I really am going to miss you," he said.

"I'm gonna miss _you_ ," she said. "A lot." She looked out over the city. The strands of her hair being pulled out of place by the wind glowed orange in the light of the sunset behind her. "We should just run away," she said.

"What?"

"You and me. We'll sneak out in the middle of the night. You're already packed." She said it like a joke but there was a serious edge in her voice that made his heart beat faster.

"Where would we go?" he asked, laughing nervously.

"Anywhere," she said, smiling excitedly at him. "Where do you want to go?"

"Um…I think I want to go to college."

"No, wrong answer, Michael!" she laughed, slamming her hand down on the wall.

"What's the right answer?" he laughed.

"I dunno, Paris or something."

"With what money?"

"I don't know, jeez, it's a hypothetical situation!"

"Okay, okay, Paris, then," he said.

"Thank you!" she said, throwing her hands up in the air. He laughed.

"What will we do in Paris?" he asked.

She smiled flirtatiously. "Whatever we want."

He raised his eyebrows. "Too bad it's a hypothetical situation."

Her eyes widened slightly in surprise. He looked away, embarrassed. He shouldn't have said that. Every time he was alone with her he forgot how wrong this was.

Lindsay picked up her drink and sat on the ground, leaning against the wall. He sat down next to her. The sky had faded to a dusty blue now.

"Lindsay?" he said.

"Yeah?"

"Uh, I mean, I know it might be hard, but… please try to take care of yourself when I'm gone, okay?"

Lindsay laughed. "You think I'm gonna fall apart without you?"

"No, I didn't mean—"

"No, it's fine," she interrupted. "You really did help me last fall. But you don't need to worry, I'll be fine."

"Good," he said, though he wasn't completely reassured. "That's really good."

She laughed and leaned against him, resting her head on his shoulder. He remembered when she'd tried to this on the Fourth of July and he hadn't let her. At the time he'd thought he'd done the right thing, but now it seemed ridiculous. A warm breeze swirled around them, causing feathery strands of her hair to brush his face. He looked down at her hand resting on the concrete. Could brothers and sisters hold hands? He realized he'd never cared less. He put his hand on top of hers. He felt her body tense slightly against him. Then she twisted her hand around and interlaced her fingers with his.

He leaned his head back against the wall and looked out at the lights glittering on the hills in the distance. He knew he was going to miss this. As much as he wished he didn't feel this way about her, he wasn't quite ready for whatever this was to end. Maybe it wasn't over. He would still call her everyday and she was going to apply to the Dominican University of California, which was only half an hour away from Berkeley. Maybe in a year things would be right back to this crazy, thrilling state like nothing had happened.

 _Don't,_ he told himself. He couldn't hope for that. Something was going to happen if things continued like this. If he was being honest with himself he was surprised that nothing had happened already. He hoped they would stay close, but he needed to do his best to move on and maybe find someone else and hope that in a year he wouldn't think of her as anything but a sister.

But since it was their last night together, it wasn't going to hurt anyone if he let himself enjoy the pressure of her body against his and the knowledge that if he turned and kissed her right now she would kiss him back. He thought about the rollercoaster ride that had been this last year. He wished he didn't, but he was glad things had gotten like this. And up here with her head on his shoulder and her hand in his and the rest of the world feeling so far away, it seemed like the perfect way for it to end.


	36. Chapter 36

_August, 1987_

Lindsay looked out at the lights glittering in the darkness as they drove home. Her head felt heavy against the headrest from the alcohol. She tried to block out the bitter disappointment that was building up inside her, but it was no use. He was leaving tomorrow, and she would have to accept that everything that had happened in the last year had amounted to nothing.

Maybe in a year when they were living near each other again it would still be the same, but she didn't believe that. She knew he wanted to put this behind him. She understood why, but it didn't make her feel any less angry. Why would he want things to go back to how they were before when this was so much better? Now he was going to go to college and she was going to stay home and maybe he would find some college girl and try to pretend this was just an embarrassing phase that was best forgotten, when it was the happiest she'd ever been.

She didn't know what to do. She couldn't make a move, not after what had happened on the Fourth of July. She felt another stab of pain at the memory. She wished he knew how much he'd hurt her. He probably did know, he just tried not to think about it, how hard it had been for her to build up the courage to even hold his hand and how it had felt when he pulled it away. But maybe now things would be different. That night when they'd gotten home he'd looked through his college guide just like he'd said he would and put together a list for her, and just now he'd held her hand. _He'd_ held _her_ hand. But as much as she wanted to believe that he wouldn't reject her again, she knew it was probably wishful thinking. Maybe he would kiss her back, or maybe even more (a little thrill went through her at the thought), but even if he did, what would happen after that? She had a hard time imagining him wanting to be in some sort of long-term relationship with her. No, he would just say it was a mistake and that it was disgusting and wrong and then things would be awkward between them and everything they'd built over the last year would be ruined.

But maybe it was worth the risk. She had to be with him, she couldn't handle the possibility that they might go through their whole lives without ever even acknowledging that there was something between them. And what if this was the best chance she was ever going to get and she was letting it slip away, or maybe it already had? She just needed more time. If she had another month she could figure out what to do. Right now she was drunk and confused and frustrated, but he was still leaving in the morning and there was nothing she could do about it.


	37. Chapter 37

_August, 1987_

Michael stood in his room and looked through the list he'd made of things to pack to make sure he'd gotten everything. It was late and everyone was asleep except Lindsay, whose light was still on across the hallway. He was surprised she was still awake. She'd barely been able to make it up the stairs she was so drunk when they'd gotten home half an hour ago.

He guiltily remembered how he'd held her hand on the roof. It wasn't that bad, it was just holding hands, but it seemed so much worse. _Too bad it's a hypothetical situation._ What had he been thinking? It was a good thing he was leaving tomorrow, he needed to get out of here.

He heard footsteps in the hallway. His door opened and Lindsay came in. His mouth went dry when he saw her standing there in the doorway. She was wearing the same white t-shirt and acid-washed jeans as before, but somehow she looked even better.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey," she said, smiling shyly, though she didn't meet his eyes. She closed the door and walked unsteadily through the suitcases strewn across the floor to where he stood. "D'you need any help packing?" she asked.

"Oh, thanks," he said, surprised. Lindsay rarely offered to help with anything. "Uh, no, I'm pretty much done."

"Oh, okay," she said. She had one arm across her body and she was looking at the floor. "I can't believe you're leaving tomorrow," she said, her voice wavering slightly.

"Yeah, me neither," he said, wondering why she looked so nervous. He watched her take a deep breath and then exhale slowly.

"I'll miss you," she said.

"I'll miss you, too."

The corners of her mouth curled up into a small smile, but she still didn't meet his eyes. She bit her lip.

"Uh, is there something you wanted to talk to me about?" he asked uncertainly.

Her mouth opened slightly. She looked up at him. Then she laughed. "Yeah, something like that," she said quietly. Then she stepped forward and kissed him.

He stepped back in surprise, but she put her hand behind his head and pulled him back to her. He stood in shock for a moment, trying to process that this was actually happening, but she didn't pull away, she just kept kissing him desperately, and then without really making a conscious decision he was kissing her back. He felt her tense in surprise, and that just made him hate himself even more, that she'd thought he wouldn't, but then she was wrapping her arms around him and he was losing himself in the taste of vodka on her lips and the feeling of her hand in his hair. He uncertainly put his hand on her waist, then moved it to her back and pulled her closer to him. She made a small noise of surprise, but he ignored it, thinking about the feeling of her body against his while half-heartedly trying not to enjoy it.

She pulled away from him and took off her shirt, revealing her lacy black bra. They stared at each other for a moment, both a little stunned. He thought he saw a glimmer of uncertainty in her eyes. But then she kissed him again, with even more intensity and desperation than before, and all he could do was kiss her back. He vaguely registered her hand moving down his arm and then she took his hand in hers and climbed onto the bed, pulling him with her. He climbed on top of her, pushing one of his suitcases to the edge of the bed to make room for them. _Your sister,_ he said to himself, but it just made him want her more. She wrapped her legs around him, kicking the suitcase off the bed as she did so that his books and clothes spilled out on the floor.

"Oh, sorry," she said.

He laughed shakily. "It's fine."

She laughed, too, and something about the sound of it made him realize that this was Lindsay, more familiar to him than anyone. They looked at each other, a little surprised to find themselves there. She smiled breathlessly up at him. He kissed her again.

She wasn't nervous anymore, he could feel it. His worries were starting to fade into the background as well. He didn't know how far she wanted to go, or how far he wanted to go for that matter, but he tried not to think about that as he kissed her mouth, and then her cheek, and then her neck, passing over the necklace he'd given her. She sighed as he moved down her neck, and he kind of liked that, that it was him who was turning her on like that.

She reached down and fumbled with the button on her jeans. His heart skipped a beat. They couldn't actually have sex, she was his sister, they were twins. But then she was unzipping her jeans, and pulling them off, and he was struggling to remember what was so wrong about it. He kissed her again, afraid to do anything else, trying to ignore that his first time was going to be with his sister and that the word "incest" was playing over and over in his head. But he wanted her so much, he'd wanted this for years, and it didn't feel wrong, it felt inevitable. It was okay, no one would know as long as they were quiet.

She could get pregnant. A cold shock went through him as the realization hit him. He tried to ignore it, he wanted her so badly. It was unlikely, just one time, but Jesus Christ, what if he got his sister pregnant?

He pulled away from her. "We shouldn't," he said breathlessly.

"Doesn't matter," she said, and kissed him again. He closed his eyes. They didn't have to go all the way, they could just keep doing this. But it didn't feel good anymore, he was too repulsed by the idea of her having his deformed baby. They didn't belong together, it was exactly the opposite.

He pulled away again. "No, we really shouldn't," he said, climbing off of her and sitting up. She propped herself up on her elbow.

"It's okay," she said. "No one will know." She smiled weakly. "I love you so much."

He looked at his sister sitting on the bed in her underwear, her hair coming out of her braid, her face flushed from the alcohol, telling him that she loved him.

"This is wrong…" he said, more to himself than to her. He got off the bed and quickly walked towards the door.

"Wait, Michael," she called after him, but he ignored her and closed the door behind him.

He stood in the dark hallway, his heart pounding, the reality of what had just happened finally sinking in. He leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. It was okay if he never acted on it, that was what he'd always told himself, as long as he never did anything about it. But he hadn't gone through with it, that had to count for something. But he should have stopped it as soon as she'd kissed him. He thought about how he'd climbed on top of her, kissed her neck. God, it disgusting, and wrong, and perverted, his own sister.

 _I love you so much._ Right then, like that made it okay, when really it made it so much worse. She wasn't really in love with him, she was just confusing her normal, sisterly love for something romantic, so desperate for someone to be attracted to her. That was how this whole thing had started, the only reason she thought she was in love with him was that he was the only one who had paid any attention when she was starving herself. He shouldn't have let it get this far, he shouldn't have led her on this whole last year just because he liked the attention. What was wrong with him?

He jumped as he heard the creak of footsteps on the stairs. He hadn't realized anyone else was still awake. Gob came up the stairs.

"What's up with you?" he said when he saw Michael's face.

Michael sighed. "I've made a huge mistake."


End file.
